Take me on a Train to Nowhere
by We-have-problems
Summary: Sequel to It Was All a Game. Harry has been betrayed in the most intimate of ways by the most intimate of people. How can he continue this war when every day he is reminded of Draco? How can Draco continue this war when he knows what he's doing is wrong but is trapped by his own machinations? Can love save the day or will the Wizarding World bear the weight of the Hero's failure?
1. Chapter 1

Draco lay in his bed, his heart pounding, sleep practically nonexistent. It was 2 in the morning, the day that the Order was moving Harry to a safe house. His 17th birthday. He'd only known due to the fact he was forced to go to the horrid meetings the Dark Lord called upon. They were terrible. Most of them included plots on how to kill Harry, which made Draco's stomach twist and turn inside out, his throat close up, and eyes sting with tears.

Throughout those meetings Draco would be asked questions about Harry and his weaknesses, which in Draco's eyes there were none, but he would lie anyway, saying he was very deceived and trusts people too easily. Things that would go along with his so called "plan to seduce Potter."

If they caught Harry tonight, the Draco would have to watch over him in the cellar, a job he didn't think he could handle, for watchmen of the dungeon would have to torture their victims, but at the same time Draco wished he could do it so that one of the other Death Eaters couldn't bring pain upon him.

He just prayed that Harry wouldn't get caught.

There was a knock at the door and Draco sat up immediately. He'd been waiting for this. If Harry was caught, it would be Greyback, telling him to report to the dungeon and watch the captured. If it was his mother, everything was okay.

The handle took an eternity to turn as the door revealed Narcissa Malfoy in an all black cloak. Draco stood and ran to his mother, burying his face in her chest. She wrapped her arms around her only son and stroked his back.

"Please tell me he's okay," Draco mumbled in her neck. Narcissa closed the door behind her and shh-ed him. She pulled away and grabbed Draco's cheeks, forcing him to look her in the eyes.

"The good news is that we didn't catch him. However the order was smart. They made decoys out of him. I'm sure the used poly juice potion so that the Dark Lord didn't know which one was him. That's the problem. We don't know which Harry was the real one, so they attacked them all. A few of them got hurt very badly, but none the less there were no Potter casualties."

Draco just shook his head, and was about to say something, but there was a loud bang downstairs which interrupted their thought process.

"That must be the Dark Lord. He must be furious. Stay here get some sleep. I promise everything will be alright...someday." She kissed his forehead and left the room quickly. Draco was about the follow her when he heard his door lock, probably a precaution his mother wanted on him.

Thousands of scenarios filled Draco's mind. Which hexes did they use? Did they hit the real Harry?

He had to know.

He sprinted to his desk, almost spilling over his ink in the process, and began to write.

—-

Dear Harry,

I understand you absolutely hate my guts right now, but I need to know if you're okay, if you're safe. I'm so sorry this had to happen to you, to us, but it did. Despite everything I've put you through I just need you to know that I really do love you. Maybe one day we can work this out, maybe one day you'll understand. Just know I'll be waiting for that day.

Happy birthday.

Draco

—-

He opened his window and put an owl treat on the sill, waiting for his owl to fly to him. The night brought in cold air and a musky smell that reminded him of the forest he and Harry use to meet up in. He began to think about all the times they shared together, exchanging gifts, kissing, holding each other, sleeping even. The laughs, the smiles all flooded back to him, but a fluttering of wings knocked him out of his trance.

The bird swallowed the treat and awaited instructions.

"Bring this to Harry Potter. Avoid being seen at all costs, drop off the letter, then come straight here."

And with that, the owl flew off into the night, leaving Draco hoping that Harry was safe.

—-

Harry was just fixing his collar, ready to put on his bow tie when there was a rapping at his window. He opened it to find a black owl drop a letter on the floor before him, and fly away without a thought. He stared at the envelope, bewildered. Taking a deep breath, he opened it to find that neat, cursive handwriting that he knew all too well.

Anger flowed through each And every single vain placed in his body. He crumpled it up and threw the paper across the room which coincidently bounced back and landed right in the doorway. He yelled in frustration and took a pillow and launched it at the wall. He then picked it up and plopped it on the bed where he then dived face first I to the pile of feathers and shouted profanities.

There was a soft knock on the door and Harry got up from his lingering tantrum to find Hermione with the ball of paper placed between her fingers. She shut the door behind her with a concerned look on her face.

"Are you okay?"

"No I'm not Hermione, okay! He sent me a letter! That bastard sent me a letter! He has the nerve to send me a damn letter!"

"What did it say?"

"I don't know! And I don't care! He's making this so hard on me. I'm trying to forget him and he's making it physically impossible!"

"Maybe you should read-"

"No I shouldn't! He's just trying to have another laugh at me!"

"Maybe he's not laughing. Maybe he is generally concerned about you," Hermione said while skimming the words on the crumpled letter.

"Hermione, all the death eaters know! I'm sure you-know-who does too! I'm just a laughing stock to them! And now watch, he's gonna try and lure me in again just so I can fall for him and hell, he'll wanna meet me somewhere and then he'll capture me and send him to his precious dark lord."

"Or maybe he does care about you. Have you ever thought about that?"

"No! He doesn't! Hermione, he's a death eater! Why are you siding with him!"

"I'm not siding with anyone, Harry. I'm just saying that I've never seen you or him happier then when you were together."

"That's the point! He played it off well!"

Just then Ron walked in, a confused look on his face.

"What's with all the shouting, is everything alright?"

"Everything is fine, Ron. Can you go out into the garden and get me 14 tulips to put on the tables. Your mother wanted me to ask you," Hermione improvised.

"Not the tulips! They are all the way in the back!"

"Then you might as well get a move on. It starts in an hour."

"Yeah.. Right," Ron said before running out the door. Hermione turned back to Harry.

"You need to tell him," she said quietly.

"No Hermione! There is no way in hell he'd ever look me in the eye again!"

"He is your best friend, Harry. He has a right to know."

"No absolutely not! His family and the Malfoys hate each other more than the Dursleys hated me!"

"At least tell him you're gay. That he deserves to know." Harry went silent for a little bit, his voice smaller than before.

"I never really felt like I was gay. I just loved him for who he is. Whenever we kissed I never thought to myself 'oh, I'm kissing another man.' It was just him and me." Hermione patted him on the shoulder. "You don think he'd be mad at me?"

"No Harry! I think he'd be angry if he found out another way. I think he'd prefer to hear it from you. At least voluntarily you can control what your saying. What if someone told him that you dated Draco? At least if you told him you were gay then it might be easier to hear."

Harry out his head in his hands then pretended to rub his imaginary facial hair which he shaved away.

"You're right...I'll tell him after the wedding."

"Good! Now let's get down stairs and help set up! I need to go find Ron and tell him we don't need those tulips," she laughed and Harry smiled.

And to his ignorance Hermione placed the balled up paper into her purse.

—-

The wedding was hectic along with the aftermath. After the death eater attack, the trio found themselves at Grimmuald Place waiting for Dobby to return with Mundungus.

Harry's hands were sweaty and his heart was beating fast and hard. He was gonna tell Ron. He had to.

Oh come on, let's face it, he would rather battle death eaters than tell his best friend his only secret. But that's the thing, it was the only secret Ron didn't know.

Harry was standing in the hallway while Ron was in the kitchen. he took a deep breath and as he did so, Hermione walked up to him.

"You can do this, Harry. I believe in you. he's your best friend, you'll be fine. It might be a shock to him at first, but he'll come around. I promise."

Harry nodded and with heavy footsteps, went into the kitchen and sat across from Ron.

"Hiya mate," he said while munching on a piece of stale toffee he found in the cupboard.

"Hi," Harry replied nervously, "Ron there's something I need to tell you."

"Okay, what is it?" His tone was playful.

"It's something rather serious. something I've been meaning to say for a long time."

Ron nodded his head, "go on."

"And I can trust you? You'll support me?"

"Of course, I'm only your best mate, Harry."

"Okay," Harry said with a deep breath, "here goes nothing. I'm gay," he said slowly.

Ron went blank faced, no emotion shown which angered Harry and made him Ill tempered. he sat there for a while before Harry spoke, clarifying his last statement. "As in I like boys. like I'm romantically attracted to them-"

"I know what it means. Just give me a second."

And that left Harry imagining millions of events that could happen at any second. Ron could explode, could flip out, hate him forever. what seemed like an eternity, the ginger finally spoke with a confused look on his face.

"I thought you were into Ginny?"

"No, I love her, but as a sister. Don't get me wrong she's brilliant, just not for me."

"Of all the things of the world you could tell me, I think this was on the bottom of the list," he said while rubbing his chin.

"Are you angry?"

"No of course not, Harry. I just wasn't expecting it. Wait you don't like me do you? I mean, I'm flattered and all, and you're wonderful, but I'm sort of on about Hermione."

"No! No no no no! I mean your dashing, but definitely not." They laughed. "I think you two will be happy together."

"I hope so," he took a deep breath and hid a smile. "Good for you, then. I hope you find a man that will make you very happy," Ron said.

"If I make it that far," Harry laughed.

Ron let out a chuckle. "I hope you do. Did you ever like someone back at Hogwarts?"

"Erm well yeah, I did, actually-"

"So that was your girlfriend! I knew there was something fishy about it. You never wanted to talk about her in detail. Now I know why, because it wasn't a girl."

"Err- yeah... I'm sorry I lied about it," Harry said with a frown. "I shouldn't have, I was just so scared that you'd hate me-"

"Hate you? I could never hate you," Ron furrowed his eyebrows. "You're my best friend."

"But I'm gay."

"So? It's not like you've murdered anyone. It's not like you've tortured anyone, done an unforgivable. You've never harmed anyone. You're a great man, Harry. Gay or not gay. It doesn't matter. Your sexuality could never affect our friendship. Now come on, mate, tell me who the lucky guy is."

"I-," Harry started, but the swell in the back of his throat kept him from it. Draco Malfoy, the motherfucker. "It's kind of a long story."

Ron could tell Harry was in pain. "You don't have to tell me what happened right now. Did it end bad?" Harry nodded, staring at the floor. He swallowed heavily. "Okay, mate, just tell me when you're ready," Ron pat his shoulder and relief flooded over Harry like the first wave of a tsunami. "I'll always be here for you."

—

Draco had gone into a deep depression. He wasn't needed by the dark lord at the moment, and hadn't been for a while. At least whenever he was on a mission to capture someone, he would forget. Just for a little while.

At the moment he was curled up in a ball on his bed, a place he had grown attached to since it was the only place in the house where he was somewhat safe. Somewhat.

He'd seen enough death and tortures across the house to make him sick to his stomach. To make his home, a house, not a home.

Draco was playing with he chain on his neck, something he refused to take off. The room was dead silent and all he could hear was the ticking of the Malfoy pocket watch which was located on the night stand.

Tick. Tock. Tick. Tock.

The second hand kept inching forward until another minute passed, and another. It sprouted Draco's curiously as to what time it was. It had to be late, for the moon was shining high in the sky.

He rolled over and picked up the small trinket. The glass covering the clock itself was cracked down the middle of when Harry threw it down. He could barley see the hands however in the only place that wasn't cracked, was right over the dial on the clock face. Just as the stroke of midnight rang, the number changed from 999 to 1000.

He remembered when he and Harry were confused as to why the dial was there in the first place, and then they connected it to the day of their first date. But if it was based off of how long they dated, the counter should have stopped ages ago right?

And that's when it hit him.

He ran to his desk and slammed the quill into the ink so hard that drops splashed everywhere. He had to tell Harry.

He was mid-letter when he heard something slid under his door, causing him to jump. Footsteps led away from the door and he found it safe to get up and see what it was.

A newspaper.

The Daily Prophet was bent and messy, but he could still read the headline printed across the paper:

Potter Gone Wild: The Golden Trio Breaks into Ministry

"On this afternoon on August 31st, Harry Potter, Ronald Weasley, and Hermione Granger broke into the Ministry of Magic to the ministers ignorance, under poly juice potion of 3 different ministry workers. During said unexpected visit, Potter had stolen a locket of Dolores Jane Umbridge. The attack on the Umbridge was hostile and didn't make any sort of sense, suspect telling her 'one mustn't tell lies.'"

Draco smiled to himself. And whispered into thin air "God Harry, you're such an idiot."

He skipped to the last paragraph.

"This leaves the world wondering if Harry Potter and his friends will be returning to Hogwarts, where Severus Snape will be crowned Head Master. 'I don't wish to see him back at school,' said Snape, 'he is wanted by he ministry and I highly doubt on his return.'"

Harry, not at Hogwarts? He'd have to face 7th year alone? Draco was hoping to make it up to him this year. It didn't sting that much that Harry wasn't going, subconsciously he realized that the Gryffindor wouldn't show up. What hurt was that he had to go back to Hogwarts and face the term, knowing he might never see Harry again, unless he would be in the arms of the Dark Lord.

And that was scary enough as it is.

—-

Anger. So much anger. Irritation and hate filled his veins as the chains of the locket beat down on Harry's neck. He couldn't take anymore of that damn radio, so he went outside to get some fresh air in hope to ease the gnawing buzz, but alas it almost seemed to increase it.

But what was truly aggravating was the envelope sitting next to him, mocking him. He looked up into the moonlight to see the last flutter of the black owl take off once more. It had been the 12th letter this month. They were practically coming every day, or every other day, and it was driving Harry mad.

He hadn't opened one, not one. He was too afraid, of what, he didn't know. It still flabbergasted him on how the owl had even found him, how it penetrated their protection charms, how the dark magic hadn't exploded in the shield. From that point on, he grew frustrated. His pain was flowing out of him and he didn't hear footsteps behind him.

"Take it off," the girly voice said forcefully. Harry didn't listen, he just sent daggers to the letters, hoping his eyes would slice through them. "Harry, I said take it off! It's making everything harder on you!"

"No, I deserve it...I was so stupid... He could never love some gullible disgusting loser like me. Nobody can."

"Harry James Potter if you do not take it off right now-"

"No!" He held it to him. Why, he didn't know. The anger was addictive, like a drug, like alcohol, like Draco.

Hermione knocked him on his back, holding his hands to the ground with her left forearm, grabbing the necklace off of Harry despite his wrestling. Once the locket was away from him he instantly relaxed but a look of worry and despair.

"Better?"

"Yeah," he said breathlessly, "now give it back!" He flipped her over and grabbed the chain, attempting to get up and sprint, alas Hermione latched onto his ankle and kicked the chain out of his grasp.

"Why are you so obsessed with that thing?"

"Because I am! Okay?"

"No, not okay. Me and Ron are worried sick about you! You need to stay away from it."

Harry took a deep breath a sat up, and Hermione mirrored him and stated wiping off dead leaves from her sweater.

"Hermione, you don't understand," he said shaking, tears springing to his eyes, "I-eh-every time i look at those letters I want to forgive him and I'm so scared that if I read one of them I'll fall in love with him all over again and I know that's wrong. He betrayed me, Hermione. He did it voluntarily, but yet I still find myself scared to death that he's with you-know-who and despite how much a hate him, If he gets hurt I know I couldn't handle it. I fell I love with a man that doesn't exist, an imaginary person, yet I can't let myself get over it! That's why..because it blocks out all this," he pointed to his heart," and it lets me be angry so maybe I can get over him!"

She scooted next to him and he buried his head onto her shoulder and violently sobbed. Hermione pulled Harry close and hugged him for a bit.

"You need to talk it out. Everything. From the minute you liked him. It's been 2 years..no wonder you need to explode. And you need to read the letters." He looked up into her eyes and she read the vulnerability, the innocence in his eyes. He just wanted to love and to be loved, and now he was stabbed with hate because of it.

"No, I can't handle it Hermione. I just can't. This is too hard, it hurts too much."

"Harry, it's your first love, your first break up... Of course it's going to hurt."

"I don't want it to," he whined like a 13 year old boy.

"I know. Come to me when you want to talk about it," Hermione said softly. "And no touching this!" She grabbed the locket and went back inside the tent to be with Ron, something Harry wished he could do with Draco.

So he began walking.

—

There was a rapping at the door to Draco's quarters. He was elected head boy since death eaters practically were the new faculty. It was a nice room but it wasn't home...no where was home anymore. He never got into trouble, but then again he never talked. He was finished taunting the gryffindors. Only his remedial group of friends could get a peep out of him. The absence of Harry was maddening. . Sure he wouldn't get much sleep at night, and sometimes the nightmares were horrific, but who would be at the door in the middle of the night?

He got out of his plush bed and ignored the icy sting of the floor as he wrapped his silk robe around him. He had a sleeve on when the door opened itself.

"Can't you knock," he snapped before seeing who it was.

"Didn't think you'd care considering it was me," an all too familiar voice said. Draco's head bolted up to see those green eyes, that known frame, that lightning scar.

"Harry," he whispered breathlessly and his heart skipped a beat, letting the robe fall to the floor.

Harry bolted over to him, in need of contact.

"I'm so sorry I didn't believe you," he pleaded before he plunged his mouth upon Draco's. The blonde was in so much shock he couldn't feel the heat, couldn't feel anything. Harry began saying 'I love you' between each kiss and he violently ripped off Draco's night attire to the point in which he was bare naked, and Harry cupped his ass after he tore off his own outfit.

Harry threw himself and the latter on the bed and Draco rotated himself on top, kissing every patch of bare skin until he was breathless and they lay together on the bed.

"We can run away together, Harry. We could live together. Nobody would exist. We could pretend this never happened."

"No we can't," seriousness conquered Harry's face.

"Why not?"

"Because it was all just a game, Draco. I don't exist."

"What the hell are you talking about Harry, you're right there."

"No I'm not. I hate you, remember? Because you didn't trust me enough to ask for help. How could I ever love someone like that? I'm just a ghost of the person you deceived."

"Harry...please just- please don't say that. You love me remember?"

"Open your eyes."

"They are open!"

"Open your eyes," Harry repeated over and over until he finally did. He was back I'm his room, alone.

Another nightmare.

It wasn't the first one, but it was one of the worst, yet.

Draco was sweaty and there were tears on his pillow. He looked around the room, focusing on a poster of Harry- one that the ministry made. "Undesirable no. 1" it read.

It constantly reminded him that Harry was missing.

Gone.

His eyes traveled down to his left arm, covered in silk. He slowly lifted the sleeve, tickling his own skin, hoping the horrid mark wasn't there. To his disappointment, it was still existing on his pale flesh.

It always will.

—

—

Harry knew it was a bad idea. He knew that he was digging himself in a hole that was going to be hell to get out of. But he was bored and curious and lonely, and damn it, something had to work. Something had to destroy this thing. Something had to get him off of his mind.

"Open," Harry hissed in parseltongue, awaiting the ferocity of what ever he was about to face. But nothing happened. Not some fancy spiel made up of smoke and dancing figures, or hissing, or even any face of Voldemort as Harry was expecting.

The locket was barren and dry and almost dead. He waited. Nothing happened.

He waited for ten minutes. Nothing happened.

He waited for twenty minutes. Nothing happened.

Maybe the locket was broken? Maybe he hadn't said it right? Surely it'd opened, it'd responded. But why wasn't it working?

He spent the next hour wondering the same things, examining the locket, it hissing when he touched it, until he'd almost fallen asleep in a pile of sodden leaves painted in cold dirt. But what woke him to a dead freeze was the screaming of his name.

"Harry!" It wasn't Hermione; she was asleep in the tent over on the other side of the hill. It wasn't Ron; he'd been gone for weeks now.

He sat up and looked immediately to the locket, which still hadn't done anything. It wasn't coming from there.

"Harry!" It came again, and Harry stood this time, attempting to pinpoint where it was coming from. Footsteps stomped in the distance, coming closer, and Harry drew his wand, pointing at the direction that they were coming from. Closer and closer, Harry glanced over at the trees across from him, when suddenly a boy with white hair and mercury eyes stood next to.

"Harry." The words were a whisper as Draco laid his eyes on him. Harry immediately perked up, his hands sweating and heart beating through this chest. "It's you! I can't believe it's you."

"Draco," Harry mouthed, but then shrieked it, "DRACO!"

He ran to him, Draco sprinting as fast as he could and they met at the bottom of the hill, Harry with open arms, Draco, too, but despite their momentum, Harry didn't feel a thing when they connected, he was so numb.

"Draco, what are you," Harry started but realized that Draco wasn't wrapped in his arms, rather behind him. "Draco?"

"Harry," Draco smiled as Harry turned around, "You're alive."

Harry frowned. "You're not real."

"What are you talking about, Harry? I'm right here," Draco complied.

Harry reached out to touch Draco's cheek, however instead of the skin stopping him, Harry's hand went completely through his face.

"You're not the real Draco. You're fake."

"I'm not fake," Draco still smiled.

"Then why are you smiling," Harry said in a tone of sadness. "I hurt you. You shouldn't be smiling right now. You should hate me-"

"I don't hate you! How could I ever hate you?"

"Because I broke your heart," Harry's voice cracked. "I broke you like you broke me."

"I forgive you," Draco grinned. "I'm with you now."

Harry swallowed as tears formed in his eyes. But then he got angry. "I ripped your heart out! You wanted marriage and I gave you hell."

"We all make mistakes, Harry. How could I not love you," Draco beamed.

"Don't tell me you love me!"

"Oh, but I do! I always have. I know I should have told you, but I wanted to make it special."

"Any time would have been fine," Harry growled, thinking back to the memory.

"But why not when I asked to marry you. You remember that night, don't you?"

"Every second of it," he swallowed. His heart burned like it was being skinned like a fish. The very sight of Draco made him want to throw up. "Every damned second of it."

"Are you sure? I could play it all out for you." Swiftly, Draco's clothes changed to those of that night. Draco went on one knee, reaching in his pocket to grab a stunning silver ring.

"Don't," Harry barked.

"Oh, but Harry, don't you ever think about what could have happened if I just was a little more careful? If I'd just have buttoned my cuffs with different clasps?"

Harry backed away from him slightly. "Stop it." This was a special kind of torture.

"We could have been so happy," Draco smiled, standing and stepping towards him, before frowning. "But you ruined it."

"You ruined it," Harry lied.

"You know I'm innocent, Harry," Draco said. "You've always known I was innocent. We were just too happy to be true because everything you've ever had has been taken from you and you thought if you threw me out before I could get taken, too, you wouldn't have been so lonely."

Tears slipped Harry's eyes, and the fake Draco tried to wipe them but couldn't. That was true. That was completely true.

"Remember how happy we were?"

"Yes," Harry's voice cracked.

"Oh look, there we are now," Draco smiled, putting his hands on Harry's shoulders and spinning him around to where the locket was. Up from it came green smoke, framing two boys dressed in school robes, laughing and smiling.

"Draco," Harry whispered involuntarily. It hurt so bad, looking at the sight in front of him, remembering the exact joke they were laughing at. It was Trelawny, Friday the 13th: the very beginning that started two years of complete, laughable bliss.

"Remember that?"

Harry nodded.

"Do you remember what it was like to kiss me?"

"Draco, please don't." Harry shut his eyes, not wanting to see what was in front of him.

"You've forgotten already," Draco sounded disappointed, "I haven't. I loved kissing you."

Harry opened his eyes to see the two completely wrapped up in each other, making out so languidly, so lovingly; Harry biting Draco's lip softly, Draco pulling him closer in a need that they both constantly had.

His heart ached. "Please, Draco, make it stop."

But it didn't stop. The fake Draco had started taking fake Harry's robes off, undoing his tie sloppily but kissing him in the process of it to make it look like an art.

"Do you ever wonder what it would have been like? Making love?"

"I..." Harry trailed, examining the two in front of him in awe. Harry's shirt was gone and Draco's was hanging loosely on his shoulder, Harry moving to take it off. They looked naked now, due to the fact that the smoke cut them off at their waists.

"I would have treated you so well. I would have been so soft. I would have been so soft, it would have hurt you because of how loving it would have been."

The fake Draco kissed the fake Harry's neck, so tenderly the real Harry thought he was going to puke. He kissed down his neck and then chest, going lower and lower until Draco completely disappeared, and the thought of what he was doing under the smoke made the real Harry's imagination run wild.

"You would be so beautiful. So beautiful making love to," Draco purred in the real Harry's ear. Because of what the fake Draco was doing to the fake Harry, the fake Harry threw his head back, his mouth opening as if he was moaning and eyebrows creased in ecstasy. "Look at you."

A hand was placed on fake Harry's stomach, it looking erratic within itself grasping his abs like it was a source of breath.

"But just think about the make up sex after we took each others virginity. Think about how rough it would have been, how wild we could have been."

The fake Draco came back into view and picked Harry up, slamming him against the tree and lifting him. Again, the smoke had cut off his view, but Harry knew exactly what was going on, the fact he could see the tops of his knees bobbing up and down to Draco pounding into him. His mouth hung open and he pulled fake Draco closer, grasping onto his bear back with his fingernails hard enough to bruise. They kissed so riotously.

"Love me, Harry, love me," he fake Draco chanted.

The real Harry fell to the ground, his knees buckling. He begged for this agony to be over, but nothing stopped it, and he doubled over on the ground and shut his eyes, the sounds of him and his lover making love filling his ears. He couldn't stand it.

"We could have had that," Draco kneeled next to him, "It would have felt so good." Somehow, he forced Harry's chin up, pushing him to watch, and Harry whimpered and cried as he did.

The fake Harry was on edge and the fake Draco kissed down his neck moaning against it. And then the fake Harry's moans got louder and louder each time, and then he started screaming Draco's name because he was so close. And if he looked closer, the real Harry could see tears coming from fake Harry's eyes that the fake Draco then kissed away. Fake Draco cried, too, and watched him intently, also calling his name because he was so close.

"What would have happened if I told you," Draco asked next to him. He pondered. Just before they were about to release, the scene changed and the real Harry cried out in misery. "What, you think I'd let you see the best part after what you've done to me?"

Harry just whimpered and cried, wanting the nightmare to be over.

"But what would have happened if I told you the first day back from holiday?" The two fake puppets in front of them changed to look a little younger, Draco much more healthy that the last time he'd actually seen him in real life, even if over summer he did have the pain that Harry could only imagine. They were in their school uniforms. "Would you have hated me like you hate me now?"

"I hated you because you almost killed me and my best friend," Harry growled.

"Oh no, you hated me because I got the Mark. Just because I almost did murder people, that's not why you hated me. You hated me because I got a tattoo on my arm that you didn't like. So tell me. Would it have mattered if I told you in the beginning or in the end? Tell me, Harry, was I clever to wait?"

The fake Draco stood in front of fake Harry with the look of insecurity he always had when Draco brought up the mark.

"Time doesn't matter when one betrays. You would have hated me then just as much as you hated me that night. I was smart to wait because we both know this wouldn't have happened."

The two fakes in front of them played what was supposed to happen. Fake Draco was crying as he lifted his left sleeve, and fake Harry, although heartbroken just listened to Fake Draco's story.

"He made me do it. I wanted to defend you but he would have killed my friends, my family. He would have killed you, too, and I can't bare letting you go," he choked. "I love you, Harry."

"I believe you. I'll help you," the fake Harry said, and he moved to hold fake Draco's hands. "You know I'll always love you, Draco."

"H-he want's me to kill someone, Harry," the fake Draco sobbed, "I can't do it. I can't."

"Who?"

The fake Draco shook his head. He was breaking down. "I can't say it," he shook his head.

"Please, Draco," Harry begged, kissing his hand. "I know you can't. You're not a murderer; you're not going to do it. I'll keep you safe."

"You won't hate me?"

"I could never!"

The fake Draco nodded. "D-Dumbledore."

The fake Harry hugged him as the fake Draco cried and cried and cried.

"Hey, you're going to be okay," the fake Harry said.

"Okay," fake Draco eventually calmed down. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

They kissed, and the real Harry's heart blackened.

"Tell me, Harry, would you have reacted that way," the Draco next to him asked, almost teased. "Would you have listened?" Harry just broke down next to him. "Why didn't you listen to me? I needed you!"

"I-I..."

"'I' what, Harry? You wouldn't have. You would have hated me just as much as you do now."

"I don't hate you," Harry sobbed.

"But then, oh but then you tried to kill me," Draco saddened. The fake Harry raised his wand to him and the fake Draco was thrown back, the green smoke turning to red.

"I didn't mean it, I swear," Harry begged.

"I loved you."

"Loved?"

"Yes loved. Not love."

"You don't love me anymore, don't you remember," Draco snarled.

The scene in front of him changed.

"Tell me you don't love me. Tell me you don't love me and I'll make you forget. Just tell me you don't love me."

Fake Draco moved in to kiss him but fake Harry pushed him away. "I don't love you."

The real Harry broke down just as the fake Draco did. Fake Harry ran away, gone into the smoke, but fake Draco remained in tears.

"You ripped my heart out," the Draco next to him screamed.

"I-I'm sorry, D-Draco! Please take me back, I n-need you!"

"But what if I've already found another?"

Harry froze. "Draco?"

"Think about it. I'm at Hogwarts. People who weren't available to me are now, people who are much smarter, much kinder, much more attractive, funnier, cleaner than you. You broke my heart and now I've got hundreds of rebounds. Maybe The One is in there, too. Maybe you're just a test to get to my real partner. Maybe you're already dead to me."

The image before him changed. Draco was older and looked healthier and smiled. He looked charming. But then a second figure walked into view, a girl, whose face was unrecognizable and almost hidden. Draco seemed so happy.

"Draco! No!" Harry turned to the Draco next to him, but he was gone, leaving Harry to watch the horror in front of him.

The blonde grabbed the girl's cheek and stroked her face. "I love you."

"I love you, too," she said.

Harry picked up a stone next to him and threw it at the two, it going right through the fog. They started kissing. Harry lent down to pick up a branch when he looked back up, the two were naked, just as he and him were a few minutes ago, her pressed up against his chest, moaning.

Harry threw the branch, completely missing, and screamed and cried and sobbed and wept into his forearms, his body completely shaking and giving out as his chest bled.

"Harry, tell it to close! Shut it!" Hermione went up to him, rubbing his back.

"Leave me alone!"

"Harry! Shut it!"

"No," he shrieked, the pain feeling like a drug. "Fuck, I love you, Draco, I love you!"

Hermione tried to pick him up by his chest, but he gave way, his body too weak to move on it's own. "I love you, Draco," he sobbed.

"Please, Harry!"

"Draco!"

"Harry," Hermione shouted over his tears.

"Get off of me!"

"Harry you need to close it! I can't! I don't speak parseltongue!"

Harry just kept crying and crying.

"Please, Harry!"

"Close."

Hermione dropped him into the mud, Harry landing face first. He didn't care. He just kept weeping and sobbing and crying and screaming until his voice went horse. His chest bobbed so violently due to his sobs, Hermione thought he'd been possessed.

She had to admit, she'd never seen him this broken, let alone broken at all. Sure, when Sirius died, he cried and yelled, but he'd run out before it went past that. And even when he found out about the Mark, he'd cried, but she never saw him do more than cry.

But this. This was special. This was brutal. This was cruelty.

She stroked his back, but he pushed her away.

"Go away!"

"Harry-"

"I don't care! Just go! Anywhere! Just leave me here!"

"Harry-"

"GO!"

She left him at the point to where Harry was crying so hard he coughed.

"I love you, Draco."

—

It'd been three years since their real first date. What would be their 3 year anniversary.

1095 days.

Harry found himself in a depression. Ron was gone and had been for quite some time. But that didn't matter and if anything it added on to the sadness he was feeling. He felt like crying but he just couldn't.

The weather bit at him as he sat outside during the cold and bitter day. Hermione was next to him reading a book: True Signs of True Love.

"Harry, did you know that if someone's eye color changes slightly it means they've found their soul mate?" Harry grumbled and threw a fist to the floor.

"I swear, Hermione, you're trying to make this worse on me."

"What are you talking about?"

"Draco. His eyes changed from silver to mercury after the first time we kissed."

"Oh Har-"

"Drop it."

"It's been a year hasn't it?"

"Exactly it's been a year and I'm still not over it, I'm probably never going to be over it. I don't want to talk about it."

"But maybe talking about it would help you."

"Doubt it." Hermione got up and went inside the tent only to come out with a stack of envelopes and a book with small papers sticking out of it, stretching it to make the book unable to close all the way. "No Hermione, I'm not doing this."

"Read it. Please." She tossed a ball of paper from her pocket. Harry gave up arguing with her and uncrumpled the note.

He scanned it at first but then reread it two more times. Hermione had a smirk plastered on her face as Harry's eyes lit up, but he tried to hide it.

"That doesn't mean anything," he bit.

"Really, if this master plan was a trick wouldn't he stop by now?"

"He's probably trying to capture me. You need to look at it from a death eaters perspective. Just lure in the bait."

"Fine go to the next one."

Harry hesitantly picked up the second letter and opened it, revealing the handwriting that seemed to mock him.

—-

Dear Harry,

Despite the hatred you feel towards me, and even though you think this was a trick I need you to know It wasn't. Everything was real. Every second of every minute of every hour of every day of every month of every year we were together since February 25th has been real. Every single second since I left you has been filled with regret.

I should have told you.

And if I die during this war, carrying this burden on my shoulders, know I will happily rot in hell knowing I deserve what I get.

I'm so sorry.

D

—-

"Sounds to me he really does care."

Harry ignored her, however, and threw away the paper and moved to the next one.

—-

Dear Harry, or Potter, or whatever you wish for me to call you,

I know you can't still be in love with me, it's impossible, but I would appreciate it if you sent me anything back, just so I know you're alive. A simple "Fuck off" would be better than nothing.

I love you. I always will. Always.

My heart still beats for you, Harry Potter. Every single beat.

But why would you care? I'm just scum to you anyway. I'm scum to everybody.

But they don't understand that I didn't chose to openly defy you. He would have killed my family, my friends, and then he would torture me until every single secret of yours is spilled. Then he would find you, and kill you. At least I choose what I tell, which isn't anything real of course.

But you don't trust me. I don't deserve to be trusted.

Wherever you are, good luck.

D

—-

Dear Harry,

Remember when I gave you the pocket watch? Of course you do, but there was a small dial that kept growing as each day past. I figured out what it counted.

The days in which the one that gave it to you fell in love with you.

It's at 1000 right now.

D

—-

Dear Harry,

I love you.

D

—-

Harry clenched at that one. His throat burned as he let out a choke he was holding in.

—

Dear Harry,

I don't think you understand how much this hurts.

Every single time I inhale my chest feels it will explode and I think of you, knowing you could never feel the same way as I do for you, again.

I can't sleep. I can't eat. Even if I do sleep I dream of you. You taunt me. Mock me. I don't appreciate it. Stop it.

The worst one is you forgetting who I am. We're at Hogwarts and it's our anniversary, and I bring you flowers, the ones from the forbidden forest, the ones you love to smell. But you don't remember who I am.

Another consists of you and I in a bed in the room of requirement, having sex by a fireplace, my dark mark doesn't exist, and you kiss me in my favorite spot. I hate it.

I hate it because it's driving me mad. Everything seems so real, something we would do, and I just want to know what it feels like to have you inside me, me inside you, but that won't happen.

If you can tell, I don't even care what I write anymore, you never respond anyway, how could I even know you're getting them? I guess it's another way to vent.

D

—-

Potter,

I wish I could forget you. I wish I could forget everything about you. The way you smelled. The way you tasted, and the way you looked.

I wish I could forget how you used to lick your lips before you ate treacle tart. And the way you shook in your sleep when you had nightmares. The way you looked into my eyes, how they lit up like a Christmas tree. I wish I could forget Christmas with you too.

I wish I didn't put so much in to this so that I could at least try to forget everything we had together.

I wish I could.

I wish I could forget how you crinkled your nose when you laughed really hard. And how when you were all sweaty after quidditch, you would wipe it off with the bottom of your shirt. And maybe how the way you sounded when your breath evened out when you slept. And how you sounded when you moaned. When you said my name.

When we were at bliss.

I wish I could forget you. How your fingers felt against mine, or how you stroked my hand with your thumb. How you looked in your stupid glasses. Prat.

How behind those stupid glasses you had those eyes that I could never fully discover because each cell was too elaborate for the time we had together.

I wish I could forget your stupid, fucking lips. And your stupid fucking smile. Merlin, I get so angry when I think about that stupid. fucking. dorky. smile.

I wish I could forget your stupid, fucking face. I wish I could forget the first day we met in that stupid fucking robe shop. And that day on the train. And all the days before that when I admired you. When I wanted to be your friend no matter what it took.

There was a large splatter after that, and the paper had a hole in it. Harry guessed it was when he broke his quill out of anger. He also realized that each and every word was a vein leading to Draco's heart. Every word. It burned him to think about it.

Harry actively cried.

You know what's funny about this whole stupid fucking Plan to Seduce Potter? That I never ancipated the only flaw in my plan, which was completely falling for you.

I'm fucking stupid. Why? Because I'm so fucking in love with you it hurts to... exist.

I sit here in every class, staring at your seat the whole time, wondering where the hell you are, if you're a live. Please be alive.

So I can kill you. Slowly.

But I know if you walked in, I would probably jump you, and kiss you until you bled, and I would hug you- Merlin, I wish I could forget your hugs- I would hug you until my arms fell off. Even if you hated me. Even if you hexed me. Or hurt me- hell, you've done that enough all ready, I probably wouldn't feel a thing.

I would touch every fiber of your skin, push you up against the wall, kiss you until you couldn't breathe anymore, like we used to. I wish I could forget that too.

I wish I could forget how warm you always were, even in the cold. I wish I could forget our place in the forest, where I fell in love with you.

Harry felt the paper, although it be bone dry, it was crinkled as if there was water on it previously. Draco cried when he wrote this, probably harder than Harry was now. He let out a sob for making Draco cry enough for it to drip on the actual parchement.

Yet I go there every day, wishing you were there with me. Wishing I could touch you again.

I wish I could forget your stupid, fucking name. I wish I could forget everything about you.

I wish I could breathe without thinking about you.

Draco didn't sign it, and Harry guessed he didn't have the courage to. He sobbed.

Dear Harry,

Please please please get this letter. It may be the last one I write, and I just need you to know that I do love you. I forever will. And even if you don't, you need to know.

The dark lord is angry and I barely escaped him and snuck back to Hogwarts. I feel as though every time I see him, my life flashes before my eyes. I feel as though I'm about to greet death. If one day that happens to me, know that I'll never stop loving you. Ever.

I just wish I could kiss you one last time.

D

—-

Harry sat there with his head in his hands, heart going to split into pieces.

"God, I'm such an idiot," he said into nothing. Tears streaked his cheeks.

"Harry what is this," she asked, holding the Draco's diary.

"Our whole relationship in writing."

"When did he give you this?"

"Christmas why?"

"How much did you read of it?"

"I think I got up to the part right before 5th year ends," he said wiping water from his face.

"You never got to 6th year? When did you find out he was a death eater?"

"No didn't, and our 2 year anniversary why?"

"Harry I think you should read this." She handed him the diary, the last entry opened.

—-

Dear diary,

This whole time I've been writing to an unknown, someone who's supposed to listen to me, someone who's supposed to replace those who don't. But I have someone who listens, and does it damn well. I've been wondering who I've been writing to but now I know who.

It's been you Harry. It's always been you. You've always been there for me, and I trust you enough to tell you anything, but there is one thing I can't say in person.

Harry, I know you'd rather hear this from my mouth, but I know you. You have a short temper. You'd over react, think I did this on purpose, but I promise you I didn't. I know I can't hold this in longer, so that's why I decided to give you this for Christmas in writing, because want you to listen to what I have to say, not look at my face and pick up things you want to hear, and discount the tiny details that makeup the story.

Don't worry, I know you'll get mad. And even more angry when you realize I didn't say this out loud to you. That's another reason I decided to stay away from you. I can't stand to see the heartbreak on your face. This won't be easy, but I just need to let it out. Here it goes.

Over the summer Voldemort called me to dinner. He saw what we did, he felt your feelings for me. He questioned me, And everyone else involved in our little secret. We decided to go along with it being a trick so he could honor us instead of scold. I know, I'm stupid. I broke your promise, but I did so in reason. Instead of throwing me in the dungeon and forcing the answers out of me, I was able to choose what I said. If not, I'd be killed. He took the plan as deceitful and was proud I came up with such a clever idea. Inevitably, he made me take the mark. I couldn't refuse.

Harry, I know you don't want to hear this, but I'm a death eater. I have to be, or he said he'd kill my family, and you. I could do it, Harry.

But that's not the worst part. I want to throw up because of what I'm about to write. He wants me to kill Someone. Harry, I can't do that! I can't! How am I supposed to look an innocent man in the eye and end his life?

I'm so scared, and I hope when you read this you'll understand that I have to do this.

I just hope you understand before the task is fulfilled. I can't eat, or sleep, and it literally kills me every day i have to look you in the eye and lie to you.

I'm so sorry.

Please help me.

I know you'll Always be there for me. You know where to find me.

Love,

Draco

—-

Harry froze, covering his mouth as though he were to puke. He began to sob violently. He felt a piece of paper fly out of the binding. Harry looked down at the paper to see it be the picture of Draco and him kissing.

He held the picture close to his heart and started to cry so hard he almost coughed up blood.

How could he be so ignorant? So wrong about everything? Harry never gave him a chance to explain.

He just hoped that one day he'd be able to make it up to Draco.

—-

Draco sat in the cold dark air of the forbidden forest, wearing Harry's old Gryffindor hoodie, looking at the picture of Harry kissing his cheek. He let a few tears run down his cheek, his heart burning.

"Happy anniversary, Harry, wherever you are," he whispered into the wind.


	2. Chapter 2

"Shit," Harry heard Ron say as they found themselves being led down a cobblestone walkway. How they'd gotten there… well, that was a long story, and if you're really that curious, go watch the movie.

With a swollen throat, Harry inhaled sharply, examining the big 'M' on the gates of Malfoy Manor, and immediately, Hermione grabbed his hand, squeezing it. "Do you think he's here," he whispered to her, just enough for her, and only her, to hear it.

"No. He's probably at Hogwarts," she murmured back to him, and Harry frowned with sad eyes, well, what was left of his eyes. The spell Hermione had used made his face numb and tingly.

"I wouldn't be able to handle it anyway."

"It's been a few more months-"

"Quiet," a snatcher barked, and the doors to enter the Manor had opened, leaving a stale, eerie coolness to chill them to the bone. They were guided into a room bigger than the Dursley's house, with small furniture and tables within it; however the most extravagant piece was the crystal chandelier hanging from the ceiling.

"Bring him out," he heard Bellatrix say, but his eyes, well, eye, was glued to the floor, and his heart beat so rapidly and hardly, he felt that every Death Eater in the room could hear it. Harry closed his eye, shielding himself from Lucius and Narcissa, and everyone else. He didn't want to be there of all places, and a gnawing at his heart reminded him of that.

He was expecting Voldemort, truly, in fact, he looked forward to it. He was just about ready to stop running, to face it and end everything whether by Voldemort's death or his own. Harry heard footsteps clatter down the stairs, and he opened his eyes to face someone much much worse than Voldemort. Their eyes connected.

At the sight of him, Harry gasped, and gasped loudly on accident, leaving the entire room to stare at him, and Bellatrix started laughing.

"Really, excellent job, Draco, making him look like a lost puppy that just found its owner," she sang with a smirk. "We didn't think you'd come so in handy with your stupid little plan." Draco froze, wishing he could do anything but that. He wanted to scream and yell and cry and just grab his heart so it wasn't ripping at it's stitches, but it was. He wanted to run over to Harry, because he bloody well knew it was Harry, and punch him and kiss him and kick him and steal him away from all the bad in the world.

How could he have gotten caught? How is he still even alive? Holy shit, he's alive!

It was his biggest fear and greatest dream to see Harry standing exactly where he was, and his blood tingled and nerves set fire at the sight of if.

"Is it him," Draco asked, his voice cracking as he kept a solid face.

"That's why you're here," Greyback taunted. "No one knows Potter better than you."

Harry heard Ron struggling behind him, wanting to yell back at him, prove him wrong, but Greyback was completely, honestly right, much to Ron's ignorance, and Harry regretted not telling him considering this could be their dying day.

Draco just about stepped back, ready to make a break for it. They wanted identification. He'd done it so many times before. Idiot Death Eaters would think they had him, except they would bring in those with brown eyes and tan hair and pretend that the muggle or halfblood had used polyjuice. Those were the easy ones to get rid of. His mother helped him act more that of a Death Eater: how to talk and what to say, how to sneer properly, how to make those in question feel worthless and useless- it helped with interrogation.

He's learned how to make others feel pain with just the sheer thought of thinking it. He's broken noses and poisoned people and kicked them and knocked them out with a single blow to the head; he'd hexed people and tortured them and heard them scream and conditioned himself to crave it; he's used unforgivables (sparingly, but he still used them), and although he felt guilty about it, his culpability had become less and less as the days ticked on.

Draco had grown bitter. He'd grown constantly angry, and he thoroughly enjoyed building the walls that surrounded him- the way he fit in with everyone else, his defense to the evil that surrounded him.

Except the problem with walls: they can crumble.

"Do you know these two," Bellatrix hissed, but Harry didn't hear an answer. Yet, he did smell a smell that made his mind wander to a simpler, happier time.

"They don't matter," Draco said, his arm being pulled by Lucius closer to the three.

"Lock them up then, in the cellar," she ordered, and Greyback grabbed hold of Ron and Hermione, leaving Harry alone in front of his biggest fear. "Well, go on, Draco. Get a better look."

Instead of having to look Draco in the eye, Harry bowed his head and stared at his shoes, his heart hammering inside of him.

"Oh now now, lover boy, don't be shy," Bellatrix smirked, and Harry felt his eyes water. "Help him out, Draco."

Draco, with shaky hands, grabbed Harry's chin gently, and tried to push him to look at him, but Harry refused, using as much strength as he could. Don't be stubborn, Harry, he thought, although he wasn't even sure himself that it was reality in front of him. He realized those walls were cracking at the seams, and he grasped Harry more forcefully, his fingers squeezing both of his cheeks, and he dug his nails into the skin. Harry still refused.

"Need a hand?" Bellatrix went up behind Harry, and kicked the back of his knees so they would buckle, and she grabbed his hair so she could force his head up, leaving Harry to yelp in pain. "Is it him?"

There was no doubt in his mind that Harry was right in front of him, and Draco's entire body went numb at the thought of it.

"I-I can't be sure," he lied. He was ten thousand percent sure.

"Surely you can, Draco," Lucius sneered. "You were around him daily." Once a week, Draco corrected in his head. "You should know whether or not it's him.

"I-I…I don't think so..." He didn't break Harry's gaze, and his stomach set on fire. "What happened with his face?"

"Said 'e picked something up in the forest," a snatcher said.

"We can't call him with the wrong person," Bellatrix warned, "He'll kill us all. We have to be absolutely sure."

"Either it's him or not," Lucius growled back. "You had two years to be around him and you can't simply identify him-"

"Exactly. Two years. Whether or not if was fake, I was still around him for two years. I would know if it was him if I saw him, and this is not him," Draco rushed, still looking into Harry's eyes, Harry begging him silently.

"Well, obviously you can't tell with his face like this," Lucius scoffed. "Surely there's another way."

"It's not him," Draco said forcefully, still looking at Harry, and he tightened his eyelids slightly. What are you doing here?

"He could kiss him," Yaxley proposed, and everyone turned to face him, and Draco's heart stopped.

"What," Draco tried to keep from shouting, registering what was just suggesting.

"You can't be serious," Lucius scorned at him, a look of disgust on his face.

"What? Lucius, you know when you're kissing your wife and I know when I'm kissing mine. Surely after a two-year relationship, the boys would have made some form of muscle memory."

"Very well then," Bellatrix raised an eyebrow, and Harry grunted. Please don't make me, he wanted to beg. "If it is Potter, he'll probably be thrilled anyway. We'll be able to tell."

Don't you dare kiss me, Harry thought, sneering at him, a pit of anger swallowing his stomach. Not now. Not ever again. I hate you. I'm over you. Don't kiss me.

"I have to," Draco asked, holding a hard face. Harry's eyebrow twitched.

"For the good of the Dark Lord. Certainly you wouldn't mind considering you had to do it for two years. Take it as a goodbye kiss for the two 'star crossed lovers,'" she cackled, letting go of Harry as if he was fresh bait. "Go on, Draco."

Draco turned to him and met his gaze. What the hell is going on? It's a dream. It has to be a dream. No. A nightmare. Most definitely a nightmare, kissing his savior ex-boyfriend in front of his Death Eater… co-workers?

Either out of bravery or cowardice, Draco leaned forward, swallowing, and as he did so, his throat closed and eyes stung and palms sweated more than the night he asked Harry to marry him. As he pulled forward, Harry jerked back, not wanting to be anywhere close to that man. The more he saw him in his natural habitat, the more he saw him alongside his Death Eater friends, the more Harry wanted to punch him. Those extra months hadn't helped at all.

"Don't you dare," Harry snarled lowly.

Draco had to grab his cheeks and force him to stay put. I don't want to be here either, Harry. I don't want to kiss you. I don't want anything to do with you anymore. Just suck it up like a man and take it. Take it because it's you're damned life on the line, and rightfully I'm not condemned to it anymore. Me kissing you is for your benefit.

He filled the space between them and captured Harry's lips, high strung and barely moving. At first, Harry complied, but then he realized he had his arms free, so he shoved Draco away with too much hate overcoming him. He wanted to punch him but instead he spat on the ground next to him.

"Ooo, Potter-Boy wants to play," Bellatrix teased. "Come on, don't be a wimp, Draco. Play with your pet." She whipped her wand out and cast a wordless spell, leaving Harry with binds around his wrists, struggling.

"Fuck you," Harry growled in his ear and Draco's heart seared, stomach turning over and over.

Draco kissed him again, this time, forcefully, his hand on the back of his head, and their lips moved together a little more, enough for Harry to seize his bottom lip, and bite it enough to draw blood. Draco yelped, and, deciding to remain in character, he slapped Harry on his cheek to send him barking on the floor.

Finally, a third time, Draco grabbed him by his shirt and kissed him, him mumbling, "Relax, it's me," softly, enough so the others couldn't hear it, and Harry responded as much as he would. After a few seconds, Draco backed away with a look of disappointment.

"No. It's not him."

Bellatrix frowned, "What?"

"It's not. I remember how he kissed. That's not it. Potter was a downright awful kisser, and whomever this is, it's not Potter." Draco wiped his mouth with his sleeve, and for an effect, he spit on Harry as if he was nothing. He'd done it before to muggles brought in, but this time, if felt so much better.

"You can't be serious. I thought we'd finally had him this time," a snatcher said, and Bellatrix turned to him to find the Sword of Gryffindor in his hands, and all hell broke loose.

"Get out," she shrieked, whipping people and hitting people, and Draco immediately stepped in front of Harry, and Narcissa in front of Draco. "Get the girl! Get the girl!"

"No!" Before Harry could run for Hermione and protect her, Draco pulled him to his feet and took him into a different room before he could be seen.

"Don't you dare say a word," Draco said, his voice shaking. He turned and locked the door behind him, although he knew it wouldn't be long before he had to get Harry to the cellar.

Harry finally got a good look at him. Draco eyes were sunken and cheekbones stuck out and face was so pale. His hair was a mess and cheeks were flushed and eyes were watery. "If you want you and Granger and Weasley out alive, you don't dare say a word and you listen to me."

"D-"

"Don't you dare," his words were venom. Draco grabbed his chin and examined his cheek. A handprint was there. "I'm sorry," he whispered, and he whispered it again. His first wall fell when he accidentally stroked the hair behind Harry's ear. "I'm sorry, too, that I had to kiss you." He wiped his mouth a second time. "And spit on you." He examined his body to find the clump of saliva, and it landed on his chest. Draco grabbed the end of his sleeve and he wiped it off for him.

But then he took a step back and dissected his whole body. "Damn you've gotten fit," he said in an afterthought, but when he realized he said it out loud and immediately covered his mouth. "I'm sorry!"

Second wall.

"Draco-"

"No. Don't talk. You're supposed to be in a cellar right now, and I'm taking you down there, I just want you to… I don't know why I have you here, but I'm not letting you get hurt and she just… I'm sorry, okay! Fuck you! I hate it when you look at me like that!"

"I'm just looking at you!"

"No you're looking at me the same way you used to look at me- and ugh! Just shut up! I'm sorry I kissed you." Third wall down.

"Are you going to take this spell off of me?"

"No, I'm bloody not," Draco hissed.

"Why not? You have me here!"

"Because I know you and- well, I don't know you much anymore… well I mean…" he stuttered, his numb nerves setting on fire. Talking to him was worse than any torture he had to endure or put on anyone else. "Well… I kind of know you, how much could you change… shit you've changed a lot…you know what I mean… fuck it's been a year and, damn it, I'm over you! I might not look like it, but I am. Really! …Fuck why are you so hard!" Involuntarily, Draco's eyes wandered up and down his body, and when he realized what he just said and what he was doing. "Fuck! I didn't mean it like that! I'm sorry!"

"Draco," Harry tried to interject, but he kept babbling like an idiot, and although it hurt Harry to see him standing where he was standing, it made his abused heart swoon. He thought he was the only one who wasn't over their relationship. Fuck, I'm not over this relationship…

"I'm over you. I am-"

"I didn't ask if you were-"

"-it's been a full bloody year! You're not hot and you're not hard and you're ugly and stupid and how the hell did you get caught you bloody idiot!?" His cheeks were flushed and eyes were teary and he felt himself breaking by a single look from the man in front of him.

Well, there went the fourth wall.

"I-"

"You stupid, fucking idiot! Wait, you never wrote me back! I thought you were dead!"

"I'm not, yet."

"You're lazy and you broke my- yet!? What do you mean by 'yet?" Draco grabbed his shirt with his fist and held him ridiculously close to his face. "Damn it, you're not dying! You're going to fight! I'm not letting you get killed because you're too stupid to not get snatched. I'm finding a way out of here for you."

"Why?"

"Why," Draco repeated breathlessly. He had an answer but didn't want to say it out loud. "Because…"

He kissed him. He didn't know what he was doing it as he did it, but he sure did it. He grabbed both sides of Harry's face and smashed their lips together despite Harry's cry of pain in contact with the handprint. Harry didn't care anyway though. He just melted rather than fought the kiss, knowing no one was around, knowing that this was bliss and a nightmare at the same time, and he embraced it. They were startled and broke the kiss when they heard a bang coming from the other room.

"Draco, tell me. Was everything we ever had a trick? Was anything fake? Were we real?"

"We don't have time for this, Harry," Draco whispered abruptly quieter than their previous whisper-shouting.

"Nut you have God damn time to bloody kiss me? Answer me!"

"It doesn't matter now! Don't you get it? Nothing matters now. Nothing will ever matter anymore because we're at war. Nothing will ever be certain. You broke my heart, I got over it, and it's done. That's about as teenage and mundane we will ever be. And you of all things don't matter to me at a time like this."

From the other room, they suddenly heard screaming, and not just any screaming, but bloody curdling, heart-stopping screaming. Harry flinched, however Draco remained firm with a frown.

"Doesn't that bother you," Harry sneered at his lack of reaction.

"It wouldn't if you heard it every day."

"Aren't you at Hogwarts?"

Draco just looked at him with sad eyes. "Like I said, nothing's how it used to be."

Harry opened his mouth to speak, but stopped as he heard more shrieking. He started to take off, yearning to run to her, but Draco lunged forward and grabbed him by his stomach. "Hermione!"

"No. You're going to the cellar and I'm going to think a way out of this!"

Before Harry could argue, Draco released him of his charm, freeing his hands, however he grabbed them, lacing his hand in his, and he pulled him down a separate shaft that lead to the dungeon. They were silent the whole way, but their grips were firm.

Once there, Draco quickly unlocked the door and shoved Harry inside, locking it swiftly but solemnly. Ron didn't pay any attention to him, for he was with Luna trying to calm down in the result of the murderous screams coming from upstairs.

As the last fragments of Harry's spell dwindled away, his face appeared as normal, and Draco found himself lost in his features through the bars of the cellar that separated them. "Damn it, you've gotten hot," he whispered it on accident.

Harry just leaned his cheek against the bar, falling in love with Draco's eyes, which still seemed watery. "Do you kiss all your prisoners," he asked quietly.

"I had to!"

"You didn't just then."

"I know."

"Over me?"

"Just as much as you're over me," Draco said, and he put his hand over Harry's on the bar.

Harry raised an eyebrow. "Real or fake?"

"Realest thing I've ever done in my entire life."

Harry swallowed and his eyes watered. "I'm sorry," he mouthed simply because he couldn't even say it.

"No. Just fight for me. Fight for what could have been us. Maybe in five or ten years when I get out of the arrangement, we can meet each other again if we haven't moved on, properly this time. No more lies. Just us in a forest away form all the bad in the world. Just fight for five years from now."

"I will. So it was all real? No wonder you were stuttering like a house elf a minute ago-"

"Oh my god!"

"What?"

"I know how I can get you out of here!"

"How?"

Draco just gave him one lingering look, and he sprinted up the stairs without another word.

Moments later, after he regrouped with Ron and came up with a story about what he was talking about with Draco, a crack sounded and a little elf was standing in the middle of the floor.

"Damn him," Harry thought to himself with a small smile.

It wasn't long before they were free and all hell broke loose.

There was fighting and pushing and shoving and battling and Harry found himself up against Draco with almost a smile on his face because he knew Draco would never hurt him unlike everyone else in the room. The casted hexes and dodged them and they loved it because it was each other, and at one point Harry almost caught himself laughing because, damn, Draco looked good when he was fighting for what he believed in.

But everything froze then Bellatrix had Hermione under a knife. "Drop you wands, drop them! Or she gets it." Everyone did as ordered, except for Harry. "Draco, collect them, quickly!"

In the hopes to brush his fingertips, to be set on fire from his touch again, Harry held his loosely. It was even better than he remembered as Draco lingered his fingers back once he had them on him.

A crash, however, startled them from their trance, and chaos, again, broke the room as the chandelier fell to the ground and Harry immediately ran for Draco, taking the wands from his hands. "Thank you," he said as Draco quickly gave them up, although trying to make it seem like he wasn't.

And before he knew it, he was gone again.

Harry was gone again.

But for once, Draco didn't feel as empty inside.


	3. Chapter 3

There was a bone chilling knock at Draco's door. He jumped, a fright vibrating through his spine. It'd been a hours upon hours since he'd seen Harry, the most two-faced hours in his life. On one hand he felt he was yearning for the boy even more, wishing he could have at least kissed him one last time, but yet he was happy that Harry showed up and left. With him there, the temptation would grow too strong and his body would take over, whether his life in danger or not.

But then he was angry. Angry at himself for not taking the oppourtunity, or the fact Harry had the audacity

Before Draco had a chance to get up Bellatrix slammed the door open in full battle gear, a serious face accessorizing the leather attire.

"The boy. Potter. He's at Hogwarts. The Dark Lord will be calling for us any moment to attack." Draco's heart started to pound. Harry. "Draco you must listen. There is something I need you to do, a mission, that would be crucial for our side to be victorious. There are two steps. First, you need to go to the Room of Requirement. In there is a diadem with blue jewels, the Ravenclaw Diadem. Get it, and bring it to the Dark Lord."

"And the second?"

"Get the boy."

Draco froze. "Why would the Dark Lord want me of all people to fetch him?"

"He trusts you more than anyone on our side. Did you see his face when he saw you?" Did you see mine? "He's still in love with you. Act as though your on his side," I am, "and he will come with you voluntarily. This war will be over, less wizards and witches will die. He will be dead. It's up to you. Understand?"

The words rang in his ear. Get the boy. They swirled through his brain, taunting him. It was when the familiar burn on his arm called him so greatly that it tore through his bone that he replied. "Yes, Aunt Bellatrix," he whispered.

And with that she apparated.

Harry's there, in the castle. Find him. From then on, who knows what will happen, but at least you'll see him, protect him, he thought.

Draco decided to apparate in 3 minutes, enabling him to mentally prepare himself for the battle ahead. He could die. Harry could die.

Suddenly a wave of courage flowed over him. He wasn't going to die. Period. He's going to be there for him, protect him if he can. He knew what side he was on.

He took one last glance around the room, his eyes ending on the corner where he hid everything Harry gave him, all the memories they had together. Harry's jacket neatly folded, the toy lion, the basilisk fang from the Chamber of Secrets, the pocket watch, and all the pictures they took in the room of requirement. He almost ran to the table and grabbed his favorite picture before he disappeared from his bedroom.

After Harry took hold and pocketed the diadem, Draco chose to speak. He'd watched him do it the whole time, how he touched it, how he knew it withheld so much power. He wished Harry still touched him like that.

That thought gave him the will to use his voice.

"What brings you here, Potter?" Draco's heart sped as he found the boy in the room of hidden things, his hair a mess and dirt everywhere. Battle hadn't been going on for more than an hour and he already looked beat to hell. But he wasn't sure whether or not to call him Harry, their relationship completely unfathomable at this point. The Manor had been too confusing for it's own good.

It was just them in the room, no Blaise or Goyle. Obviously the movie studio got it wrong.

Harry froze, looking up at him. "Draco," he whispered, a scab being ripped open. "I could ask you the same question."

"You know why I'm here."

"Can never be certain with you," Harry bit, but his voice was shaky. "Don't know if you're here to make out with me or to turn me in."

"I've had thoughts about it."

"Turning me in," Harry raised an eyebrow.

Draco shook his head, taking a step forward, but Harry took a step back. "Making out with you."

Harry cocked his head to the side. "Can't say I haven't thought about it." Harry stepped forward. "I... I'm sorry I broke your-"

"Heart? Broke my heart? You didn't break my heart. You destroyed it."

"Chandelier... But sorry about that, too."

Draco paused, sticking out his jaw and thinking it over. He hadn't expected it. "I actually really liked that chandelier."

"It was a pretty nice chandelier."

Draco grew frustrated. "Oh would you shut up about my furniture."

Harry did. "Sorry."

"I thought you were dead." Draco's hand shook as he spoke, them all sweaty. He knees felt as though they were going to give. "This whole damned time, I thought you were dead. I was so scared," he whispered at the end, his voice cracking.

Harry didn't know what to say. He stood at Draco's icy glare and felt as he did on their first date. Draco had grown, matured, made a voice for himself, and that made him damn attractive. Harry was falling in love with him all over again within eighteen words. "H-hi," he waved so awkwardly, so nervous to talk to him.

"Don't you dare," Draco growled dangerously. "Don't you dare think this is okay, that we're okay after all of this. Don't you dare say hi to me after over a year of silence, after putting me through hell."

"Dra-"

"You never wrote me back," Draco cried, eyes filling with tears. The pain and anger over the past year etched throughout his body as he said it. "I sent you a letter almost every day and you couldn't send me one back, just to know that you were b-breathing. It would have taken a word!"

"I meant to-"

"Write me? You meant to write me? What you didn't have the paper?"

"I-I didn't have the guts."

Draco crossed his arms, his throat closing. He didn't know what to say. "You know, I"ve thought about days like today, seeing you for the first time in almost a year and a half."

"And how did those thoughts end," Harry said shyly.

"Let's just say I've come up with about ten fucking thousand different ways to kill you."

"I want the worst one. Give me your worst death. That's the one I deserve, as long as it's from you."

Draco swallowed, his throat closing so much he swore he'd choke because of it. His bottom lip quivered as he spoke, and he dipped his head. "So, falling in love with me?"

"Oh, well in that case, I'm already dead man walking."

Draco shot up, eyes wide. His heart beat so fast, he thought it'd burn out. "What? But you said-"

"I know what I said," Harry shouted abruptly, the thought of it still haunting him and he felt a rage surge through him. It was four words versus three, and Draco focused on the lie. He calmed himself. "I know what I said," he repeated softer. "And I," he gulped in pain, "I am so stupid for saying it."

Draco creased his eyebrows and went silent, the quiet biting at Harry. His lip quivered enough for Harry to see, and he stepped closer, begging the blonde to say something, anything. It was like sitting on knives waiting for words. The back of Harry's eyes watered, and the pure sight of his love standing in front of him was making it worse.

They could die. He could die. Draco could die. Everyone he knew and loved and cared for and hated and felt sorry for could die, and yet he didn't feel any sense of urgency to continue on the conversation because of the fright of Draco leaving him, hating him. Sure, people were dying, but he was too. Didn't Harry deserve a few last moments with the only person he would be willing to spend the rest of his life with.

The reality of his big mistake hit him harder than ever. He should have never assumed Draco was a death eater; never forced anything out of him; held him mercilessly until he'd come up with a way to get out of it. He shouldn't have picked fights with him. He shouldn't have expressed how he felt about Draco being a Death Eater before finding out if he was one or not because it scared him away.

He didn't blame Draco, in fact, he hadn't for a while. Not ever since those letters, hell, even before reading them.

"Do you know how much it hurt," Draco finally asked, breaking the unbearable silence.

"I can imagine-"

"You don't."

"If you forgot, I have been in hiding for the ten months without you."

"No. That night."

"I knew you weren't going to kill him. I was there, you're not a murderer-"

"Not that night. A different night."

"The night..." Harry paused thinking back to which one he was referring to. "The one where I almost killed you? Listen, I didn't know what the spell was-"

"Not that night either."

"The night that I found out about..."

"Yeah," Draco bit the inside of his cheek, holding back tears. "The night I proposed to you."

"Oh... That night."

"Do you know how much it hurt? I wanted to be with you forever. I was going to tell you how I felt about you. I was going to tell you all my secrets and about what happened over the summer after fifth year and how I got the Mark. I was forced into it, Harry, you wouldn't let me explain." A tear slipped from his eye and fell off his cheek, too heavy to even slide down it. "I wanted forever with you, Harry," his voice cracked.

What was Harry supposed to reply? He hadn't a clue. Draco, for the hundredth time, had driven him speechless.

"I can't even describe what it felt like," Draco continued on. "It was like being burned alive. But you didn't stop. You wanted me gone, you thought I was worthless."

"I've never thought you were worthless! Never!"

"I needed you, and you weren't there for me," Draco cried, crossing his arms and biting his lip. A few more tears stroked his face, this time following along his skin and leaving a pool at his chin.

"Draco, I'm so sorry. I am. I truely am," Harry stepped forward, but Draco stepped back, "Draco, please," he begged stepping forward once more, and Draco remained stationary. "If I could go back in time, I would redo it all. I would listen. I would be your shoulder."

"But you can't turn back time, can you," Draco said quietly, and he turned to walk away, both their hearts splitting as he took each step.

"Draco, wait!"

"I can't look at you right now," Draco said, "Just be careful, okay?"

"Draco!"

"Harry, just go. You're wasting time. People are dying."

"I'm not wasting time. Not with you," Harry ran after him. "You're not a waste of time! You're the only person I care about right now, war or no war! Draco please, I can't lose you again!" Harry stared at Draco's back as he walked away, thinking of a way to stop him. He grabbed his arm and spun him around.

"Harry, leave me alone," Draco cried, pushing him away.

"No, I'm not! Not now."

"Don't you get it? I can't stand looking at you! It hurts too much-"

"I'm in love with you!" Harry screamed it, and hadn't even noticed. His face fell numb, fingers shaking, tears running down his face. "I'm in love with you," he said in almost a whisper, his voice splitting in pain, "And I love you, and god damn it, theres a war going on and I'm not losing you again! You're amazing and wonderful and I'm a fucking idiot, okay?

"I was so afraid of you betraying me that I was betraying you without even noticing it. I'm wrong. I'm so wrong! And I can't even fucking sleep at night because of how stupid I am! I haven't eaten. Every night I had nightmares about you telling me you loved me and... and," he started sobbing. He couldn't see past his glasses. "Fuck, I know how much it hurts because that's exactly how I felt, too, how I feel now.

"I'm in love with you and I'm bleeding out at the pain of it, Draco. I can't lose you again. Not now. I c-can't do this now. You're the best thing that's ever happened to me, and if I could turn back time to any point in the universe, instead of making sure Tom Riddle wasn't alive, or bringing my parents back, I would fucking pick you! I would have said yes, Draco, if I wasn't so stupid."

"You would have said yes," Draco choked through his tear-filmed eyes.

"I would have said yes," Harry repeated, staring into his eyes. "I would have said yes one thousand times if I would have just realized that it was real."

Draco's lip quivered violently. "Oh, I fucking hate you," he sobbed and Harry laughed.

"I love you, too."

Draco grabbed him by his shirt forcefully, ready to kiss him mad when they both heard footsteps and shouting.

"Get away from him, Death Eater Scum," Ron shouted, flicking his wand towards the two of them, although he was aiming for Draco. The blonde shoved Harry away from him so he wouldn't be hit, and ducked in time, however a new problem sparked (literally) when the rogue spell hit a candle behind the couple, a roaring fiendfyre bursting through the room.

"Draco," Harry shouted, but they were seperated by the flames. The boy started to run towards him, but Ron held him back and pulled him away from it all.

"Are you mad," he yelled at him as he dragged him away from it all, but Harry struggled to break from his grip.

"Draco! No!"

"He's a Death Eater, Harry! Let him burn," Ron said, completely unaware of the conversation they just had. "He's worthless."

"Ron," Hermione shouted.

That put a shot of adrenaline through Harry and he broke from his grip, sprinting back after Draco. "Draco!"

Both Ron and Hermione went after him, Harry unaware of what was in front of him because of his tears. A wall of flames ready to collapse on Harry had just missed him because Ron had him by his stomach and hoisted him out of the way.

"Harry! Are you insane," he screamed over the crackle of the flames. Harry just stared at the fire, his lip quivering.

"Draco!"

Ron furrowed his eyebrows and Hermione hit him with a small piece of debris. But it was when he saw the tears falling down Harry's charred face, he widened his eyes in the realization. "Hermione," he begged it not be true, but the three didn't have time because a snake made of fire turned the corner of burnt material, and they took off sprinting.

"We have to get out of here," Ron exclaimed, although he couldn't think clearly because the thought of Draco Malfoy clogged his brain. Were they trying to kiss?

"I'm not leaving him," Harry shrieked, looking as far as the eye could see.

But then he heard it.

"HARRY!"

Harry spun behind him and sought for Draco, who was on top of a pile of failing furniture. He was eagerly searching the sea of flame, his voice hoarse and dying.

"DRACO!"

"Harry," Hermione shouted behind him, throwing him a broom. He grabbed it without hesitation, hopped on, kicked off, and rode like a bat out of hell towards his lover.

He grabbed onto him, arms sweaty, and threw him around the broom, ensuring his safety by keeping hold of his bicep until he knew for sure he was safe with him. Draco circled his arms around Harry and buried his face in the back of his neck. He held him so firmly, he could feel his pulse and Harry couldn't breathe.

They flew through the last flick of fire, their brooms giving out. Draco and Harry rolled over each other, cushioning each other's fall. Draco looked up to see Harry throwing the diadem to the ground, looking around desperately.

Ron came up from behind him and stabbed it, kicking it into the flames, but Harry couldn't watch the show because Draco had grabbed him, standing on his knees and pressing their bodies together. Their mouths crashed together with so much force that Harry swore he could have heard something crack. He wrapped his arms around him, hugging him as tight as he possibly could.

It was to feel at home again, to be a place so familiar yet so distant drove them both absolutely mad at the thought of what they were doing. Draco physically couldn't believe it, that he was doing something he promised himself he could never do again: he was kissing Harry Potter.

The same spark they always had made it's presence known, and Harry felt as though he was on Cloud 9. It was just him and Draco, which ended up being a toxic affair, because he wasn't aware of his surroundings.

Since they were so lost in their own world, they didn't hear the ceiling crack above and they didn't see the roof prepairing itself to cave in. Hermione, being as clever as she is, sprinted towards Draco before Ron had a chance to take him, and he was forced to take Harry. Ron and Harry skidded on the floor, barely missing debris while Draco held Hermione and formed a shield over her once he realized what was going on.

Separated by the newly formed barrier made of rock, no one could see anything because dust and ash rested in the air to a point of blindness.

"Harry," Draco coughed, getting up. The blonde searched through the smoke, screaming his lover's name over and over again, the smoke barely diluting and causing him to cough. "Harry!"

"Draco, calm down," Hermione called. She couldn't see him until the dust cleared more, and when she did, she grabbed him. "Draco!"

"Harry, where's Harry!?" Draco kept looking despite his restraint. "Please tell me he's okay! Harry!"

"Ron has him," she said, grabbing his shoulders and forcing him to look at her. "He's fine. Just calm down. You have to relax."

"Relax! You want me to relax?"

"Yes! Ron has him-"

"That's even worse! He saw us! He'll kill him!"

"You're lucky I grabbed you, or you'd be dead by now," she warned.

"He never told him?"

"He told him he was gay, but there's a difference between being gay and being gay for Draco Malfoy in Ron's eyes."

"Oh, Merlin," he put his head in his hands, and his shoulders shook, his sobs ringing through the deathly still hall. "What if I lose him?"

"Hey, you have to calm down. If you forgot, the man I love is on the other side, too."

"I'm not talking about now. You ridiculous Gryffindors won't let anyone die. I'm talking about this war! What if he doesn't make it? Everyone's after him! They made me get him, and obviously I'm not turning him in, but still! They're going to realize I failed an they're going to come after him. Hermione, you don't understand, you can't understand how much I love him. I love him so much!" Draco fell to the ground and pulled his knees to his chest, the reality of the war hitting him. "Fuck, I never told him!"

"Then tell him. It's your last shot."

He sat there for a while, head in his hands, Hermione rubbing his back.

And then he heard it and shot up.

"Draco!"

After the smoke cleared, Harry went into a coughing fit and right in the middle of it, two arms shoved him against the wall.

"Malfoy," Ron sneered. "Malfoy!"

"Ron-"

"You're dating Malfoy! Of all the people in the world-"

"Ron-"

"You chose that disgusting, filthy prat!"

"Ron, please, you don't understand!"

"Is he using a curse on you?" He grabbed Harry's cheeks and looked deep in his eyes, making sure all was okay. "Are you under imperio?"

"Ron, no! I'm not!"

"He's had to of done something to you for you to of chose him of all people! God, I'll kill him. I don't care if I go to Azkaban!"

"Ron get off of me!' Harry struggled in his brace, finally breaking free from it. He went to the opposite side of the wall, a look of anger upon his face. "You told me you supported me, you told me you'd be there for me-"

"For anyone else but Malfoy! It's Malfoy! If it was Moaning Myrtle's cousin I'd be okay with it, but Malfoy! After everything he's done to us! He called Hermione a mudblood and me traitor, he insulted my family, insults me, and you expect me to accept him!"

"He had to, Ron," Harry shouted. "But after 4th year didn't he seem to stop? He only said those things because he had to, because people would get a hunch, people would find out! Voldemort would have found out!"

"I can't believe how stupid you are!"

"Funny, he says the same thing."

"Haven't you been the one telling us how heart broken you are? Do you know how many nights I'd have to wake up to you screaming from a nightmare, start crying! All because of that filthy Death Eater-"

"He's not a Death Eater! He's not," Harry claimed. "You don't know who he is! You don't know him the way I do!"

"That's bollocks!"

"For God's sake, Ron, will you stop yelling at me! We're at war! What if I die tonight? How would feel if these were the last words you ever spoke to me? Ending 7 years of friendship like this!"

"But Harry-"

"No. How would you feel?"

Ron went silent, unable to think of the possibility of losing his best friend. Harry began to move rocks upon rocks, trying to make a safe path for him to climb and get through, however he struggled, the chunks of stone too heavy.

"Help me," Harry begged through his tears, "Help me! What if this was the last time you were to ever see Hermione? She's over there too, you know! What if this was your last chance? Would you take it?"

Ron realized how much this meant to him and began to move the rubble. As they climbed further up Ron's conscience took over and realized what was at stake.

"Mate, listen, I'm sorry okay. You could have just told me and maybe I would be so bloody pissed off, but we can argue after Tom Riddle is dead. I'm not losing you tonight."

"I would have told you but-"

"Even when you found out you were gay, why didn't you tell me, Harry, I'm your best friend! How could I hate you for that?"

"I don't know," Harry gulped, out of breath, almost reaching the top of the pile. "Like I said, I'm an idiot! We were fourteen-"

"Fourteen! It's been 3 years and you couldn't of mentioned you'd been sucking face with Draco Malfoy!"

"It was a minor detail." Harry just nodded his head as the finally cleared the top. "I'm sorry, okay, I was scared. But I have to get him. Draco," he called through the floating particulates.

"Harry," Draco got up, running after him. "Harry!" His voice cracked and sounded heart broken. Harry wasted no time sliding down the rock, not caring about the bruises he got.

They slammed together and connected in a hug so forceful, Draco couldn't breathe. "Harry," he cried.

"It's okay, it's okay. I'm here." Harry grabbed hold of his cheeks, smashing their lips together. He didn't care who was watching. He didn't care if Voldemort turned the corner and hexed them both on sight, for he's just keep kissing and kissing him as desperately as he was.

They barely moved their lips, unable to at their proximity. Draco felt along Harry's back, feeling along it as if it was his source of life.

"Draco," Harry gasped for air, releasing and looking into his eyes but keeping their foreheads close together. "You need to listen to me, okay-"

"Harry," Draco sobbed, tears in his eyes.

"Draco, please listen. You have to. you have to listen to me. Can you do that for me, please?"

Draco nodded and kissed him again, too short for his taste.

"If somehow tonight, I'm not..." His lips quivered and stomach turned at the thought of Draco being alone. "I-I pass on-"

"It's not passing on, Harry, it's murder! It's murder!" Draco sobbed in his neck. Harry just squeezed him tighter, which wasn't even possible. "Harry, you have to make it. You have to!"

Ron and Hermione embraced each other, both watching Draco closely. So this was it. This was who Harry'd been obsessing over. It made more and more sense as Ron thought about it.

"Draco, please," Harry cried, "Please listen! I need you to promise me something. A last wish, okay?"

"Harry," he whispered through his sobs.

"I need you to get over me-"

"No!"

"Draco," he said firmly. "If something happens, I need you to move on. I want you to find a wife or a husband and love them and have little Dracos running around everywhere calling people gryffindorks and gits and all those names you like to call me. I don't want you just to find another lover okay, I want you to love them. I want you to love them so much, so much. I want you to forget about me. Okay? Can you promise me that? It was just a relationship we had, it was all just a game, wasn't it?"

"No, It wasn't Harry! It was never a game. I lov-"

"Don't you dare," Harry yelled. "Don't you dare tell me this now!"

"Harry, you need to know!"

"I know! I do," he softened, looking deep into his eyes, "I've known." Harry couldn't take it anymore, he grabbed his cheeks to keep him still and looked at him moments longer. "I love you, too," he quivered before closing the gap between them and pressing their lips together.

Desperate, but relentless, they just kissed, adding as much passion as they could with the thought in the back of their heads that it could possibly be the last time they would ever embrace each other. The two went as long as they could until their lungs wanted to explode, lips sucking loosely but firm. Lovingly.

"Promise me!"

"But-"

"Draco, promise me," Harry gasped and breathed hard, Draco enjoying his breaths on his face. "If you aren't doing it for you, do it for me. Please! I can't fight this war without knowing you're okay."

"Yes, I promise." Draco nodded, swallowing and sniffing. "Promise me you won't die. You have to promise me!" Harry paused, a choke escaping his throat. "Harry! Please," Draco panicked.

"I can't promise that," Harry shook his head

"Damn you," Draco sobbed and he kissed him again, caressing his lips as though they were fragile glass. Harry disconnected them bits later and hugged him tightly, as if it was the last time. "You have to live, Harry. I'll fight. I won't let it happen."

"No," Harry pushed him back. "You're not fighting!"

"Harry, yes I am!"

"You're not. You're going to go back home right now!"

Draco cleared his tears and puffed his chest. "I'm not some damn damsel in distress! I'm staying here and I'm fighting for you!"

"No! Go home, go to the Chamber of Secrets, go, go to the forest! Just leave! Leave me!"

"I'm not the fucking girl-"

"Not to interrupt this little pow-pow, but there is a war going on and people are dying," Ron said but both Harry and Draco turned to him.

"Shut up," they both shouted simultaneously. Draco turned back to Harry.

"No, I want to fight for you! They want me to catch you, they want me to turn you in! I'm not, I won't! They'll kill me and you and we'll both fall to shit!"

"Draco," Harry said sternly, "Hide. It's my last wish for you is to live through this war, and love someone. I want you to be happy!"

"I'm not happy unless I'm with you," Draco cried, trying to look him in the eyes. It was a hard task. He lent his forehead to his, feeling the heat radiate off of it. He closed his eyes and felt his heart boil. "Please win. For me, okay? Don't die. You can't die."

"I won't. I'm not promising it, but I won't," Harry pecked his lips desperately. "I'm fighting for you. Now please just go home, okay?"

"Okay," Draco opened his eyes, but he knew bloody well he was lying to him.

"And Draco, one last thing."

"Yes?"

"Kiss me."

Draco nodded and although Harry expected a forceful, brain-smashing kiss, he got a soft, careful one. One that was short but brought tears to his eyes, one that made his imagination run wild.

"Oi, mate! We have to go! You two can make out later," Ron shouted, hearing crashes and spell casting corridors down.

Harry didn't hear him, but he did let go voluntarily, knowing that if he didn't then, he never would. Draco opened his mouth to say something but didn't say it because Harry had let go of him and stepped away, turning his back to him.

Step by step, Draco watched him go, his best friends at his side. "Harry, wait!"

Harry spun around, as fast as lightning, to find Draco on one knee, tears falling from his eyes.

"Yes," he furrowed his eyebrows.

"Marry me."

Harry felt sick, his eyes filling with water yet again. He ran to him.

"Oh bloody hell, here we go again," Ron complained.

"You're taking this rather well," Hermione turned to him.

"That's because I'm in a nightmare and in about an hour I'm going to wake up back in the forest with you and Harry and he'll tell me about who he actually dated."

"You're going to shock, then," Hermione asked.

"Yup."

Harry practically jumped into his open arms, putting his own arms around Draco's neck. "I love you," he whispered in his ear.

"I-"

"Don't you dare."

"Okay," Draco breathed, but he mouthed it, those three words, hugging him tighter. Ron and Hermione saw it.

"Mate, come on," Ron shouted anxiously, a crash breaking the couple from their trance.

Harry disconnected them and ran back to his friends.

"I didn't get an answer," Draco called to him.

Harry turned back to him. "You'll get one when I win."

Draco's tears finally dried, he couldn't produce any anymore. The battle had been called off and he'd been aimlessly walking down the halls, not caring if he'd get found by a Death Eater and turned in as a traitor. His arm pounded sorely, and blood ran along his cheek. He wished he could have saved more.

He turned the corner to yet another corridor to find two people cuddled on a staircase, sobbing. He stepped down the stairs and took a seat next to Hermione, knowing Ron would probably choke him to death if he was anywhere close to his proximity.

"Where is he," he whispered, his voice cracking. Hermione looked up to see who it was, wiping the tears from her face.

"He's...he's okay..."

"So why are you crying?" Drac knew the answer.

"Because he's not okay," Hermione sobbed before diving into Ron's shoulder again.

"What are you doing here, ferret," Ron asked, his voice laced with venom and eyes made of daggers.

"Trying to figure out where Harry is."

"Well, he's not here, so you may as well go before I make you-"

"Ron, calm down! Remember what Harry made you promise," Hermione scolded, squeezing his hand.

"He made you promise something, too," Draco perked up, but he hugged his knees to his chest and swallowed. "It's probably something impossible, just like what he did to me."

"He made us promise to try and be friends with you, or at least give you a chance," Ron said through his teeth.

"Right, so something impossible," Draco sniffed, but then he spoke more to himself. "Fall in love with somebody else... forget him. It's impossible to forget him."

"Listen, I don't know what you're up to with Harry, but it's not right. I know you poisoned him somehow. Why? Fame? His fortune?"

"C. None of the above. The correct answer is that I actually love him. It's not a trick."

"I don't believe it," Ron scoffed.

"Niether did he," Draco said gravely. "Not at first anyway."

"How did you two get together," Hermione asked. "He never told me."

"He never told anyone. We agreed on it with a few exceptions."

"So some people do know," Ron furrowed his eyebrows. "Not us?"

"You'd have to understand the story. It's a long one."

"We've got time, Malfoy. Obviously we won't be hearing it from him, so go on. Spill."

Draco paused and looked at him, eyes full of hurt. Did you have to go there?

"It started in fourth year, during the Triwizard Tournament. I want to say the day after his name got picked from the cup. We decided, well, I decided that I wanted to 'seduce' him so he would be too distracted to understand the clues. I wanted him to lose."

"You had to bag on him then of all times," Ron poked.

"Oh don't you dare get me started on you, Weasley. Harry told me how you treated him, too. He got a lot of shit he didn't deserve because of it, and you and I weren't helping. Don't you dare pin all his misery on me, though."

"He's right," Hermione agreed, turning to him. "You did treat him horribly."

"Looking back on it," Draco stared at the floor and kicked a rock. "I think I was just jealous of him. I wouldn't have admitted it then, but damn it. He had it all... well at least I thought he did. I didn't know anything about his aunt or uncle's abuse. I wouldn't have done it if I'd of known what he'd been through." Draco thought out loud, "But maybe I would have. I don't know. It's a rough call."

"He told you about his relatives," Ron asked. "It took me years to find out exactly what happened to him. I knew they were nasty, but I didn't know about the cupboard thing for a while."

"It was the same with me. We were dating for about... I want to say almost a year. He would mention them, but he would never say what he went through until I practically forced it out of his mouth."

"I can't believe he trusted you enough to tell you that," Ron stared at him in incredulously.

"He's a trusting person," Draco looked up at him, and Ron could see his eyes were filmed with water. "He always has been. He believed me right off the bat when I told him I fancied him. I still can't imagine how that worked. All I had to say was that I liked his stupid green eyes or something like that. Maybe it was his hair..."

"So you faked your relationship," Hermione crosschecked. "Because he mentioned something about it when you two broke up and I didn't fully understand."

Draco nodded. "I faked it. I faked it because I was a coincided, two-faced bastard and to admit it out loud, I had a big giant crush on him before we even started it all." He flattened his mouth. "Of course, I didn't know that then. Funny how you can mix up love and hate so easily, huh?"

"I don't... I don't get it," Ron said. "You pretended to like him to hide your own feelings from him?"

Draco thought it over and let out a dry laugh. "Yeah. I guess you're right! And it was when I tried to deny that 'Yes he makes my heart race,' and 'Yes I actually do love his stupid obnoxious scar, I adore it," at the Yule Ball that he overheard me and of course, reacted in the most logical way."

"That's why he had a bloody nose that night?" Ron sounded disappointed, as if that wasn't something that should have been done.

"What you expected me to not fight back? He was still Potter then, and I was confused. Of course I wanted to punch him."

"I remember how excited he was to see you on your first date. And at the Yule Ball, actually."

"Yeah," Draco felt his throat close. "I remember his face when he first saw me, and I remember the way he worked so hard that night to try and impress me," he choked, putting his head in his hands to collect himself. "I remember how he thought he was so clever to withold revenge on me during detention two days later."

"What'd he do? Kick your arse," Ron perked up.

Draco shook his head and sniffed. "H-he kissed me."

Hermione put an arm on his back and stroked it. "That sounds like something Harry would do."

Draco nodded sourly. "And I remember loving it. I remember the fire in his eyes when he let go and did it again, and the joy he got when he told me he hated me. And I remember how much it hurt my heart." He wanted to vomit and gagged, putting his head in his hands.

"Then what happened," Hermione whispered.

"He almost died in the Black Lake. I remember how much that hurt, too. Pansy told me to follow my heart and I followed it right to him. He was freezing, I gave him my coat, and he said yes when I asked him out again."

"What happened on that date?"

"I got my coat back."

"Was he okay with it all," Ron asked. "He's always on guard."

"Oh he was. I was bloody terrified. I thought I was going to puke on his shoes the whole time. I think he saw that."

"That you were going to puke on his shoes?"

"Possibly. More that I was nervous. I always thought being nervous was a bad thing until I met him. You have to remember my father is a complete dickhead and he practically brainwashed me not to feel emotions, so I think you can imaging my panic attacks during the entire course of the three years we've been..."

"Together?"

"Involved. We broke up."

"How did you hide it for so long," Hermione asked.

"It was difficult. Really difficult. In fact, we had our first real kiss hiding from you two. By the way, Weasley, thank you for the tip on the stroking him behind his ear. It helped a lot. It calmed him down when he had nightmares."

"That was you in the alcove?"

"Who else would it have been?"

"It's hard to imagine it."

"Would you like me to give you the play by play on how we made out when you were just five feet away from us?"

"You did," Ron's eyes went wide.

"I have to say, we really thought you'd catch us sooner," he turned to Hermione.

"If I would have known he was gay, it would have taken me less than two days with the amount of time you two stared at each other across the hall."

Draco almost blushed, but then frowned again. "We ended up missing each other, though. A lot. I mean, on Fridays we'd skip dinner and meet up in the Forbidden Forest, but that was one day a week. We'd find a broom closet or an empty alcove to talk if anything we had was dire, and if we ever got caught we'd play it off like we were fighting. It was frustrating.

"So that time when I walking in on you two in the cupboard-"

"Oh," Draco immediately smiled. "That was in 5th year. He kept having nightmares," he turned to them, "And I decided to brew him a bunch of viles of Dreamless Sleep. We were snogging when you walked in. We had to play it off like I punched him," he dwelled away. "It didn't work though, the potion I mean."

"Oh. Sorry about interrupting you," Hermione said.

"It's okay. But our relationship... we took it so slow. Like excruciatingly slow. Once a week. That was all we got. It took us about... two or three months to even kiss faster than we had. It was awkward," Draco looked off into the distance. "Really freaking awkward."

"You went from hating each other," Ron started but Draco finished for him.

"To completely adoring each other. You can imagine our first time trying to make out."

"No thanks, I'm good," Ron strained.

"I liked it, though. Maybe if we wouldn't have done that, if we would have seen each other more often, maybe our spark would have gone out. I don't know..." he bit his lip. "Probably not. But the time we were away from each other reminded me how much I actually really wanted him."

"But didn't you two fight a lot? I mean, you two did hate each other." Draco laughed at that one.

"All the bloody time. Stupid things, small fights, and we'd end up laughing at the end. He can't tell the time of day to save his damned life. I yelled at him for it. We'd kiss. Honestly, not a problem. But fighting fighting... no actually. Not an awful amount. I feel like we had the potential to but we saved it for the public. We had to give everyone a show. Why not make it realistic?

"I liked that. It kept us controlled. I mean, if I ever made a stupid Pureblood comment, he'd just say my name and I would get it. The next day, he'd call me something nasty in front of all my friends, and I'd spit at him or trip him. Even so, if we were mad at each other and didn't want to make a big spiel out of it, we could insult each other publicly and not even effect each other.

"But others were awful, though. In fourth year he broke up with me for a month because I called you a mud... That filthy word... And I'm sorry about that. I shouldn't have said it. Not once. Never. Same to you, Weasley."

"It's okay," Hermione smiled at him.

"We never really fought in 5th year, but 6th year was terrible. We only saw each other a few times within the first term. Most of the time we fought because he pressed and over the summer, that's when I was forced into getting the Mark. I couldn't physically tell him, so I didn't. But he knew. At the end we would make up after arguing probably just so it wouldn't be awkward for a month on end.

"I tried to push him away. I wanted him to be mad at me. I wanted him to break up with me. He wouldn't. He wanted to work everything out, and I loved that about him. He always wanted to fight for me. I had to break up with him at some point, and it was about two minutes until we were back together again."

"How did you know when to do certain things," Hermione questioned.

"We sort of played it by ear, you could say. Since we didn't have any experience, we had to say what was on our mind. He told me he loved me nine months in because that's what he felt and thankfully, I felt that too. But I couldn't say it back. I don't know why. As far as kissing goes... well what's the harm in that? We didn't have limits, but of course we read each other very well. I knew when he was uncomfortable. We never went all the way. We were close but never actually did it, and that was because of my horrid, stupid Mark. I wanted to though, we both did."

"Too much information," Ron covered his ears.

"Shut it."

"Who knows?"

"You, Pansy, Blaise, Crabbe, Goyle, the Dark Lord and all the death eaters."

"WHAT," Ron screamed loud enough for it to echo.

"I had to tell the Dark Lord or else he would of put me under veritasierum. He saw Harry's memories at the ministry and questioned me about it. I played it off like it was the plan to trick him. Thank Merlin he doesn't know what love is or we'd both be dead. He thought I was clever, and he didn't completely trust me, so he made me take the mark. Plus Snape. In 5th year he made us break up actually. We faked a fight, and it worked, somewhat. He said it was dangerous, being together, but despite what he said, we kept trying, kept fighting. "

"How did Harry find out? About the mark," Ron asked.

"It was our two year anniversary," Draco choked and put his head in his hands, rubbing his face and fighting back tears. He popped up again and swallowed despite his inability to. "Something came up and I desperately wanted to propose to him before it was too late. Not only that, but I love him. I was ready to tell him. I couldn't last two minutes without being with him. I knew he was The One. I got down on one knee," tears slipped his eyes as he spoke and he stared at the ground, "And I reached in my pocket. And my sleeve," he sniffed, unable to finish his sentence.

"It came up," Hermione clarified, looking at him with teary eyes.

Draco nodded before smally sobbing into his hands."I just remember his face. His face looked so... hurt. I didn't even feel it, I was shaking so bad because I wanted him to say yes, but he the way he looked at me... It was like..." Draco bit the inside of his cheek. "It was like a nightmare. It all seemed like a nightmare."

"I'm sorry," Hermione whispered, stroking his back.

"I didn't mean to hurt him. I didn't, I swear! But he didn't listen to me. I loved him, Hermione, I still do. I always will. "

"He loves you, too," Hemione replied. "He never stopped."

"Hermione how long have you known," Ron asked, looking at her in bewilderment.

"Since 5th year. I figured it out."

"He never stopped," Draco perked up. "What was he like? He seemed fine at the Manor."

"Are you kidding? He only seemed fine because he knew he was going to see you. You should have seen him on the way in once he realized he was going. He had to pretend to cough because he gasped so loud."

"Really," Draco spoke louder, his eyes lighting up. Ron scowled at him, and Draco furrowed his eyebrows. "What?"

"You forget you're the one who put Harry through hell."

"It's not like I wanted to-"

"You didn't see him," Ron growled. "We was sick. He was depressed, hell he still is. He hasn't smiled in over a year and a half. He would wake up screaming in the middle of the night. He didn't talk unless it was necessary, I think it was a month he didn't say a word. He would cry. I don't think you understand how hard it is to see your best friend cry."

Draco grew dismayed. "I did that to him?"

"Yeah. You did," he bit.

With a stinging heart, Draco put his head in his hands yet again. "I didn't mean for him to be hurt. The last thing I could ever want is him being hurt."

The two watched him, Hermione feeling so much sympathy at the fact that they knew exactly where Harry was, and Draco didn't. Draco had stopped crying, but his eyes were still filled with tears and they looked so pained.

"I imagine it was hard for you, too," Hermione thought out loud.

He nodded solemnly. "I didn't know anything could hurt this much."

"I still can't believe you have feelings," Ron said abruptly. "I never even thought about you... in a relationship," he furrowed his eyebrows, not wanting to at all. Draco Malfoy was a toad. A gross, ugly toad that Ron hated. No. Draco Malfoy was a spider. Spiders don't feel. Spiders kill. "I would have never thought you were gay."

"I didn't know," Draco turned to him. "Blaise said I was experimenting."

"And there's no way in bloody hell I could see you falling in..."

"Love? Yeah. Me either," Draco scoffed. "But I do. I love him."

"I'm sorry, but that's so weird," Ron thought out loud. "You don't feel."

"That was my argument."

"I don't understand. How could you ever... Harry? You two?"

"You get used to it," Hermione said. "If you see them together, you'll see it."

"If,"Draco turned to her, eyes filled with worry and lips slightly parted. They ignored him, and started speaking within each other.

"Hermione, how do we even know how he treats him?"

"He treats him well. I've seen it."

"How? Hermione, why didn't you tell me?"

"If?"

"He didn't even tell me, Ron! I had to figure it out."

"You could have at least told me," he argued.

"I didn't know how you'd react!"

"He's my best friend-"

"Exactly. And your his, and if he wanted to tell you, he would have told you."

Ron rubbed his face. "I can't believe he wouldn't have trusted me."

"If," Draco cried, and it was then they realized Draco was there, by them, practically on the verge of a break down.

"Didn't you ever wish to tell people," Ron asked, distracting him.

"That was the worst part of it all. It drove us insane. Of course we did. If you haven't noticed by now, it was a sick, demented relationship. It was full of lies and pain and betrayal, but at the end of the day, I'd give anything to have him back. Despite all the lies and secrets and pain, it was all worth it."

Draco took out the picture of him and Harry from his pocket, where it showed them looking into each other's eyes and smiling, and handed it to Ron and Hermione. "He'll always be my best friend."

Ron glared at him. "Calm down, Weasley," Draco rolled his eyes. You're his best friend, that will never change."

"Good." Ron looked down at the picture, examining it. "I didn't know you could smile either. It's always a sneer."

"He fixed that, too. He fixed a lot of things. He fixed how I think, how I react to things. He made me better. And I couldn't share that with anyone. That's what drove us both crazy. No matter what, I had to act like a tit all the time."

Ron looked at Harry as well. He looked so happy. So ridiculously happy.

"Please tell me where he is," Draco turned to them. Neither answered. "Please, I just... I need to know."

"Draco, you know where he is," Hermione said slowly and quietly.

"Please tell me I'm wrong," the blonde replied, his eyes watering again and throat closing. He swallowed.

"You know I can't do that."

"Yes, you can! Lie to me. Tell me he's going to be okay!"

"No Draco, I'm not. We can just hope for the best, I'm sure he'll be fine," Hermione put on her best fake smile, knowing she just told him a lie.

Draco couldn't help it, he just broke down, laying across the staircase his head on his forearms. He knew in his heart Harry might now survive and little did he know soon enough he'd find out.

Draco could feel his heart beat out of his chest as the sea of black walked to the destroyed courtyard. He hadn't seen his beloved boyfriend for what seemed like an eternity when really it had been a few hours. The last time they talked, the last time they kissed flooded back into Draco's memory as he tried to hold back tears.

The death eaters walked closer, and visible was their leader: Lord Voldemort. There was a giant walking next to him with a bundle in his arms.

Draco knew, of course he did. He could feel it when the Dark Lord hit him, the moment the emerald shined no more. He knew it, but couldn't believe it. All of his fears flooded into every fiber of his being. Draco began to feel his heart beat as fast as it possibly could without blowing into smithereens. And then finally it stopped. Draco's heart stopped as the snake like figure and his army was inside the walls of the demolished courtyard.

And in that moment Draco Malfoy'a chest was hurting so bad it was as if he was beaten by a hammer. Before he could scream in pain he disapperated before anyone could hear him wince in the splitting of his own heart.

"HARRY POTTER IS DEAD!"

Draco found himself in his bedroom, although he really couldn't see anything. He knew it by the smell, the cold, vacant environment that had once been a home to him long ago. His knees wobbled and he stumbled to the bathroom where he collapsed face first on the toilet, and vomited. Harry's body.

Harry's weak, lip body in the arms of Hagrid. Cold. Pale. Dead. Dead.

Harry was dead. Harry couldn't breathe anymore. Harry's heart wouldn't beat anymore. Harry would never smell anymore. Or touch anymore. Or feel.

Harry would never smile. Or laugh. Or cry. Or do any of life's privilege of feeling.

Harry would never love anymore.

Harry would never eat again. His favorite foods. Draco knew each and every one of them. He'd never eat breakfast again, or wake up again. Wake up.

Draco just needed Harry to wake up again, but he knew Harry would never do it again. Draco vomited again.

Harry's body. Pale. Cold. Dead.

Still. So still. Harry didn't breath. Harry wasn't moving. Harry wasn't breathing.

Draco put his had against the rim, coughing with his face burning of raw, heated sickness. The pit in his stomach didn't lessen with its contents missing. His entire body felt numb and weak. As he tried to stand, his knees gave again, so he crawled to the sink and somehow lifted himself over it. Running the tap, somehow Draco cupped his hand and got some water in it to where he could flush out his mouth, but that didn't get the sick taste of death away.

Dead. Dead. Dead body. Dead heart. Dead mind. Dead arms. Dead legs and feet and elbows. Dead hands. God Harry's hands would never be able to work again. He'd never be able to feel and touch and create. Dead.

Draco looked to the mirror, seeing his refection of sunken eye bags and hollow cheeks, and cold empty eyes that looked like everything had been taken from them, every good sight in the world. A few tears stroked his cheeks, pooling at his chin.

Dead.

Dirt clanged to his skin, and he soaked his face with another handful of water. He rubbed his face furiously with the sight of the stones, the smell of burned skin, sound of people screaming, all turning to the vision of Harry's dead body. Instead of himself in the mirror, he saw Harry. He saw Harry and rubble and fire in the Room of Requirement. He saw his face after he kissed him. He saw him dead.

Dead.

Angry swallowed him, changed his body, made him shudder and form fists and punch the mirror. It shattered easily, shards scattering about him. His hand was bleeding because he did so, but he didn't feel the sting. He started sobbing.

Harry wouldn't smile ever again. He wouldn't laugh. Draco would never hear him laugh again.

Draco's body couldn't take it: his lips trembled and hands shook and knees buckled. He fell to the floor in agony, and he started screaming. Harry's body. He couldn't see the interior of his bathroom. All he saw was Harry's dead body. Dead.

Everything hurt. Every bone and muscle ached with the same burn of losing Harry. His toes hurt as much as his chest did. His arms hurt as much as his toes did. His fingers hurt as much as his head did. Everything.

And he sobbed and he sobbed and he sobbed and he screamed and cried and yelled and cursed and grasped his heart on the floor of his bathroom, up against his sink cabinet. He could still hears Voldemort's haunting laugh at his lover's body. That was the last thing he knew at Harry's dying sight. His grave would rest there. Harry's grave. Because Harry was dead.

Dead.

No force in the world could stop his tears, his pain. So much pain. He'd never endured pure pain as he was until now. Sure, when Harry broke up with him, that was awful; but not like this. He couldn't feel anything, however, simultaneously he felt every type of bad feeling he could possible muster. This is what hell felt like. This would be what greeted him at the gates of hell, this pain.

His first round of this ended when he physically couldn't think anymore, an hour or so later it ended up being. Draco stood, dizzy and sick, and his feet carried him to his bed, and he numbly sat on the edge of it. Involuntarily, his eyes turned to his nightstand, where Harry's pictures were locked away. without thinking, he unlocked them and laid them out along the bed, looking at each of them with clouded eyes. A tear fell on one of them.

The last one he saw was the one of he and Harry kissing. They'd never be able to do that again. Draco would never feel Harry's lips again, and Harry would never feel Draco's, even if he did go back and kiss him. The lips would be lifeless and would never respond to him.

That's when round two started. He gripped the picture in hatred, it stealing from him his only happiness and destroying it in a glance at a dead body, and he rolled into his pillow and screamed again, much louder, and much more heart broken. He was almost shrieking until his shoulders shook as he sobbed again.

Draco put the picture to his heart and held it there, feeling his soul break from Harry's, feeling the connection faltering.

"Harry," he screamed over and over again. despite it being muffled by the pillow, he still was so loud, and his vocal chords ripped. "Harry, Harry, Harry!"

And he cried and sobbed and weeped and nothing could stop him. Nothing.

That was how Harry found him an hour or so later. It took him the better half of the hour to find his room, sneaking about the Manor so that the other Malfoy's didn't see him. He found them huddled by a fire in each others arms. He wondered how long they'd been there, how often they'd checked on Draco. They seemed peaceful enough.

But Draco. That was another story within itself.

He could hear him, and it pulled at his heart to. Finally, finally, he found the right door. He opened it softly, and he heard Draco's screams get audibly louder. He shut the door behind him the same way he opened it, and walked towards the bed slowly, calculating how he was going to do this. Even if he wanted to run and jump on him, he didn't, because if he did, he'd either piss him off, or scare him. The last thing he wanted was Draco to think it was a dream.

He sat on the edge of his bed, eyes glued to his shaking body, the way it curved. He'd never been able to enjoy it like this, carelessly. Freely.

But he wanted to stop Draco's crying.

He put his hand on Draco's back, and stroked his spine. Harry found himself wondering why Draco was crying so hard. He could see a little, maybe because he was happy that they didn't have to worry about being murdered anymore.

Maybe Draco thought Harry wasn't going to look for him. Yes, that's right. That's why.

The first hour, Harry had been fighting, and then he won the war, and then he immediately searched the castle in case Draco was there. The second hour, Hermione and Ron had found him and made him eat, shower, and they healed him. Then, he ran for it, and now he was here.

He should have come early, Harry decided. The second the war was over.

Harry swallowed and cringed at the sound of Draco sobbing. He hated it. It burned a hole in his heart.

"Draco," Harry said softly, putting his hand in Draco's hair and massaging his head, "I'm sorry it took me so long to find you. Your Manor is huge." Draco didn't move, in fact, he just cried even harder. "I'm sorry."

Harry laid down next to him, wrapping an arm around him. "Shhh, it's okay. It's okay. I know. Shhh."

"No it's not," Draco shouted, "Harry's dead!"

"Shhh, Draco, I'm not."

"Harry," Draco sobbed, clutching the sheets.

He followed his hand along Draco's arm to his hand, where the picture of them stood crumpled in his fist. "I love this picture of us," Harry said, trying not to make it awkward, however it was bloody hard to. He buried his head in his neck and kissed it lightly anyway, feeling the veins of his throat convulse.

Draco cried into his pillow, his vocal chords sore and overused. Tears ran down his face uncontrollably, and he kept weeping despite Harry being on top of him. He'd had plenty of hallucinations like this before. "Harry!"

"Draco, shh," Harry cooed, stroking his cheek. He kissed his shoulder, but it wasn't enough. Nothing was enough. Draco still sobbed. "Shh, I'm okay."

"Harry's dead, he's dead," he hyperventilated.

"Draco, I'm here, I'm here, I promise." Draco didn't listen, and he kept crying, body trembling, and Harry's heart broke more and more with each sob. He couldn't stand seeing him like this. Sure, he'd seen him cry before, but not 'the love of my life is dead' crying. "Draco, please," Harry choked. His eyes watered. "Look at me, Draco."

"H-Harry," Draco shrieked into his pillow.

"Draco!" Harry climbed over him and grabbed at his shoulder. He didn't stop. He got worse. "I'm not dead!"

Harry pushed him, grabbing his face and cupping it, forcing Draco to look at him. He kissed his forehead. "Shhh, relax. I'm here, Draco. I'm not dead. I promise."

"Harry," Draco cried. "You're not real. You're dead. You're de-ad!"

"No, I'm not. I promise. I'm here. I didn't die, I-"

Harry was caught off from speech when a hand connected to his cheek, a slap so hard he fell off the bed and landed on the wood floor with a thump. He grunted, grabbing his face, it not helping the sting at all. "Damn it, Draco!"

Draco froze, his mouth dropping. The room went completely silent, well, except Harry's groaning on the floor. And then Harry heard the springs of the bed as Draco moved to the edge of it. When he looked up, he found half of Draco's red, puffy face wearing furrowed brows.

"Whenever I dream of you, my hand always goes through your face. Normally you go away after that," he said quietly.

"You're not dreaming," he clenched,

"But y-you were dead," Draco hyperventilated, yet again. His doe eyes: Harry loved them. It made him look so innocent.

"No," Harry almost whispered, sitting up and crawling on the bed again. "Didn't your parents tell you?"

"What? My parents? I haven't seen them," Draco tried to hold back a sob. He reached out and touched Harry's cheek, finding it red. Draco's eyes widened as he examined it. That never happened in his dreams.

"Why wouldn't they tell you," Harry furrowed his eyebrows in anger, blinking away tears. "Draco, I beat him. Voldemort. He's dead. I won. We won the war. I beat him. He's dead!"

"But you were dead!"

"I was faking it! I promise! It's me," Harry smiled, and he felt his eyes water again. He touched Draco under his wrists and played with his hands. "It's me. We won. We can be together, I promise. You're not dreaming."

"I'm not dreaming," Draco asked, his lip sticking out a bit with doe eyes that Harry just wanted to swim in. They filled with tears.

Harry shook his head. "No. I promise. And I just need to tell you, no offense, that you are a bloody ugly crier," he let out a laugh.

Draco jabbed his shoulder and then lunged at him, wrapping his arms around his neck, tears still falling. He knocked him backwards, pinning him down and sobbing his face into his neck and sobbing in it. "Y-you're alive! You're alive," he wept.

"Yes," Harry smiled, wrapping his arms around his waist. "Yes, I am. I'm alive, and you are, and we made it though the war." Draco just kept crying in his shoulder.

"You're alive," he shouted, cutting off his air by tightening his arms on accident.

"Not much longer if you keep at choking me," he strained.

"Sorry," he sobbed, and then he got off of him just to get back on him again. He straddled his hips and put his hands on either sides of his head, so he could see him. Harry had been crying too, his eyes were watered and dilated. His face was clean, however, newly washed, newly shaven. Even then, he could see Harry had bags under his eyes. He was tired. Tired of the war, tired of hiding, tired of being scared. Draco understood it, and in his opinion, Harry looked bloody gorgeous.

"Draco," Harry said, physically because he couldn't believe it. "Voldemort's dead! You're safe, we're safe." The face he was making made Draco's head spin.

"He's dead?"

"He's dead!"

Draco smiled. "And you're alive!"

Harry nodded and bit his lip. "And you are, too."

Draco searched him, his face, seeping it in, admiring the smile that was on his face instead of the frown. But then he started laughing out of pure joy as a few more tears stroked his face, and Harry started laughing too. "He's dead!"

Draco collapsed on top of him, losing all grace and control, and he kissed him fiercely with a whimper. He kissed him so hard, and tried not to cry as he did so. That in it of itself was difficult. Harry couldn't breathe, yet again, but this time it was on his own accord. Draco was on top of him, his weight pushing deep into a bed. A bed. He and Draco were on a bed. A big soft bed that they could make hours and hours of love on because they could.

Draco ran his hands through Harry's hair, messing it up. Their faces were so close that Harry's glasses were crushed in between them, and in fact, if he checked, bruises could be shallowly forming on the bridge of his nose. He didn't care. He kissed him harder, fisting his shirt, and eventually turning them so that Harry was on top, invading his mouth with no regret, no remorse.

"Harry," Draco moaned, and he ran his fingers under the hem of his shirt. He stroked the skin. "Harry," he started laughing, and he bumped his nose against Harry's, gasping for air, choking as he got it, and kissing him again. "Harry." He couldn't believe it. Harry was on top of him. Harry was on top of him, breathing, moving, tasting, touching him. "You're alive!"

He could barely see, but when he opened his eyes to look into Harry's own, more drops fell from his eyes as he felt along Harry's back. Did it truly hurt so much to heal?

"Yes," Harry choked, trying to hold back a sob. "I am. And you are. We're alive! Voldemort's dead!"

"Harry, I want to do it! I want to make love with you," Draco gasped as Harry kissed his jaw. "Please! Take me!"

"If that's what you want."

"It is. Please, Harry!"

Harry kissed him again with tears straining his cheeks, just as hard, because damn it, he could. He could do whatever he wanted. Their bodies were so close, so hot, so haywire. Nothing could stop them from touching each other the way they were, that is, until the door opened and the scream of Lucius Malfoy caused them to stop.

"POTTER! What are you doing to my son," he snapped in a white ball of fury. "Get off of him immediately!" Lucius reached for his wand. "He does not love you, he does not care about you. You were a pawn! My son is not homosexual. He has a wife that he's going to marry—"

"Father, I'm actually very homosexual—"

"Silence! Potter, off of him!" He pointed the wand at the two of them.

"Hold on," Harry said, bold and courageous and strong. Draco wanted to maul him, because damn was he sexy. Harry climbed off of him and walked towards Lucius in a strut, as if Draco was now his property, as if Harry owned him and Lucius did not. "What kind of father conceals an outcome of a war to which their entire family was deeply involved, to which completely determined the rest of their lives together, wholly or not? What kind of father abandons his own child in his room after fighting in battle and seeing innocent people die? What kind of father houses a murderer to protect their wife and son? What kind of father beats his own family—"

Lucius slapped him, and Draco leapt from the bed, standing in front of Harry. "No! You don't touch him! How could you let me think he was dead!? How dare you!"

"Potter is not of your concern, Draco. How dare you turn yourself against me? After all I've done for you! I saved you during the war—"

"You did no such sort," Harry argued, grabbing Draco's hand and squeezing it. "I saved his bloody arse from the war, you put him in danger—"

"Silence, Potter! Draco, I do not approve of this," he hissed. "This is exactly why we made the contract—"

"What, is it because he doesn't fit your pure-blooded needs," Draco pushed, "Because when I think about my future, it involves his tongue in my mouth, not yours. It involves me living with him forever, not you."

"Son, you will be no sick, repulsive homosexual! You are not gay! You have a future wife and a child to bear! You must continue the family line! Even if you are gay, which you aren't—"

"Which I am—"

"—l will not have it that you be with this disgusting, mudblood-loving tramp!"

Harry could see Lucius was red, almost white because of how molten his skin had gone. Harry spoke with an eerie calmness, and as he did so, Draco squeezed his hand tightly. He could tell if they weren't holding hands, that Harry would break down. He could see it in his eyes.

"Tell me, just to clarify, do you hate me because I beat your precious Dark Lord, because you're a washed up dead beat chose the losing side, or is it because I had your son on his back, begging for me to fuck him?" Harry cocked his head to his side.

All they could see was Lucius's eyes widen and mouth word 'avada' before Harry apparated them away.


End file.
